CAN’T HELP MYSELF
Bill Clinton’s high-living post-presidential
lifestyle had the Bush Administration on edge as it shipped him off
to East Timor as the U.S. representative to that country’s
independence celebration. That’s because as the country’s lead
delegate to the Asian nation, Clinton was traveling on the U.S.
government’s dime.
The former president, though, was well behaved. He played golf
during a layover in Hawaii and didn’t charge the green fees to
government accounts — though it’s not exactly clear why he felt
compelled to repay George Bush’s generosity in appointing him to
head the delegation by meeting with Democratic donors on the island
state and bad-mouthing the current administration.
“He didn’t do a lot of politicking,” a current aide insists.
“The president understood that Mr. Bush had been nice enough to
send him on this junket and he didn’t want to overstep his bounds
by seeming ungrateful. Still, politics is politics.”
RIDGE SECURITY
Some in the White House are growing increasingly concerned about
the state of the Office of Homeland Security. Run by former
Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Ridge, the umbrella
organization that is supposed to coordinate the nation’s law
enforcement, intelligence and emergency preparedness operations in
times of trouble, is facing charges of mismanagement. For example,
several White House staffers who have been monitoring the Homeland
Security website say that in the past two weeks there have been
several occasions where the risk assessment for threat should have
raised the color coding above “Yellow/Elevated,” a medium risk
rating. “The rating should be high if we’re using Ridge’s
definition for the code,” says a White House source. “What’s the
point of having this thing if they aren’t going to use it
properly?”
Some cabinet offices are complaining to the White House that
Homeland staff isn’t communicating with them in a timely manner.
The Treasury Department, especially, has raised the communications
issues with White House chief of staff Andrew
Card. Despite the growing numbers of critics of Ridge,
though, all signs indicate that Bush will stand by his friend. “For
now,” says another White House source.
HOUSING AROUND
House Democratic leader Dick Gephardt was in San
Francisco last week, touting his party’s chances in the next
election. Speaking at a fundraiser hosted by Democratic Whip
Nancy Pelosi, Gephardt predicted voters would
sweep the Democrats back into power on the strength of their
newfound aggressiveness with the Bush Administration. But not
everyone bought all the glad tidings.
One guest asked Gephardt what he thought of the California
reapportionment that may net the Democrats only one new seat in the
House. Predictions had Democrats gaining as many as five California
seats after reapportionment. Even more troubling is the news that
almost everyone in the state now give the Democrats no better than
a 50-50 chance of holding on to the House seat currently being kept
warm by Rep. Gary Condit.
Condit was knocked off in the primary last March by longtime
political ally Dennis Cardoza, who will face state
senator Dick Monteith in the fall. Cardoza
currently holds between a seven to ten point lead, depending on
whose poll you look at, a surprisingly low gap when you consider
the Dems attempted to reshape Condit’s district by drawing in more
traditional, liberal voters.
“We’ve done a much better job of getting voter registration
drives up and running down there,” says a state Republican staffer.
“We aren’t convinced we can win, but we’ve made that seat
competitive when it shouldn’t have been.”
Gephardt, though, insisted that all was well in California, that
the Democrats were going to “spend big” there in the fall, and that
the House races nationwide would at worse be a wash for Democrats,
who currently hold six fewer seats than the Republicans.
