America Conor O'CleryIt's the story that won't go away, the speculation that Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry might ask popular Republican Senator John McCain to be his running mate. The New York Times started the ball rolling again on Saturday by reporting that prominent Democrats want the two Vietnam vets on a unity ticket to win swing votes and unseat George Bush.
On Meet the Press next day, Democratic Senator Joe Biden point-blank urged Kerry to pick up the phone and invite the Arizona senator to be his nominee for vice-president. Senator Bill Nelson, a VP hopeful himself, said if McCain were picked there would be a "collective sigh" that said, "This feels right!" With neither Kerry nor Bush capable of bringing a bitterly bipartisan country together, CBS News said that Kerry-McCain would be a "dream team".
But would it? Democrats love McCain for standing up to Bush and his frequent refusal to toe the orthodox Republican line. However, a "collective shout" would arise from many Democrats appalled that someone with McCain's conservative voting record would be only a heartbeat away from taking over a Democratic White House.
McCain is anti-abortion and has voted against such core Democratic concerns as raising the minimum wage, federal background checks at gun fairs and prohibiting job discrimination based on sexual orientation. The Republican senator opened the door a crack to a joint ticket when he said, "I will always take anyone's phone calls," but later "categorically" ruled out the prospect, saying he wanted Bush re-elected.
It is more likely that McCain's future lies as a member of a Kerry cabinet. The Democratic nominee practically offered him a job in a radio interview when he said, "I have any number of people that I would make secretary of defence, beginning with our good friend John McCain."
(The Arizona senator might even get Defence earlier, if President Bush drops Donald Rumsfeld before the election and asks McCain to help salvage his Iraq policy, which would be a political masterstroke).
Recent polls putting Kerry ahead of Bush, and the catastrophic setbacks for Bush in Iraq, have produced a remarkable change of mood in Washington where Democrats now believe they really can take back the presidency, and maybe even the Senate, in November.
While John McCain is courted by Democrats, he is infuriating fellow Republicans with his opposition to President Bush's tax-cutting agenda, and his blunt charge that "fat cats" should be willing to make sacrifices in time of war.
When a reporter raised McCain's comment with House Speaker Dennis Hastert on Wednesday, the following exchange ensued.
Hastert: "Who?"
Reporter: "John McCain."
Hastert: "Where's he from?"
Reporter: "He's a Republican from Arizona."
Hastert: "A Republican?"
As other House Republicans snickered in the background, the reporter persisted in asking for a response. If McCain wanted to see sacrifice, growled Hastert, he "ought to visit our young men and women at Walter Reed and Bethesda (military hospitals)." McCain, who was a PoW in Hanoi, issued an acid reply to Hastert, who was satirised by Doonesbury last week for not serving in Vietnam.
"All we are called upon to do is not spend our nation into bankruptcy while our soldiers risk their lives," he said. "I fondly remember a time when real Republicans stood for fiscal responsibility. "
The McCain mutiny was joined on Thursday by three other Republican senators, Susan Collins, Olympia Snowe and Lincoln Chafee, who blocked Senate endorsement of a $2.4 trillion budget passed by the House that would permanently extend Bush's tax cuts. This was a major setback for the President who made a high-profile trip to Capitol Hill that morning to plead for approval of the budget.
McCain has a lot of support among conservatives for his revolt against the high-spending Congress. Republicans, after all, are the ones supposed to cut federal programmes. During a black-tie dinner for the American Conservative Union in Washington last weekend, where I watched Bush give the keynote address, one man refused to get to his feet during ovations for the President.
I now learn from columnist Robert Novak that he was none other than the organisation's vice-chairman, Donald Devine. The former Reagan administration official also refused to shake hands with Bush at a pre-dinner reception.
According to Novak, Devine shares the concern of many Republicans not just about the steady growth of government under a Republican president but about where the US is going in Iraq. In a recent Zogby poll, 19 per cent of Republican voters said they would not vote for Bush in November. Novak thinks they will come back on the day, "because the alternative is noxious".
President Bush is also getting rather lukewarm support from one of the most powerful Republicans who could work wonders for his election campaign.
Arnold Schwarzenegger wasn't even by Bush's side when the President campaigned in Los Angeles recently or when he toured California's fire-devastated areas. The California governor has kept his distance from Bush, even as other governors, like George Pataki of New York, criss-cross the country to support him. The former body-builder is an honorary co-chairman of Bush's re-election campaign but is far to the left of the President on social issues like abortion.
Anti-war sentiment is strong in California but Schwarzenegger is such a crowd puller he could move Bush up several points. Arnie may be playing hardball as he looks for federal aid for the Golden State, and he is still expected to be a star attraction at the Republican National Convention. But he shares one thing with fellow Republican John McCain: both are old friends of the Democratic candidate and will not join in any Kerry-bashing.
The LA Times reported that John Kerry gave a young Schwarzenegger advice on financing Pumping Iron, the 1977 film that launched the Austrian immigrant's American career. Both Kerry and Schwarzenegger today own holiday lodges in Sun Valley, Idaho, and Kerry recently met Schwarzenegger's wife, Maria Shriver, a niece of Senator Edward Kennedy, in Sacramento for a drink. Shriver disclosed later she would not be campaigning with Kerry. But she wouldn't be campaigning with Bush either, she said.
From terminator to litigator. The California governor is taking legal action against an Ohio firm that is selling a Schwarzenegger bobble-head doll for 20 bucks. He claims that as a global celebrity his likeness belongs to him alone. The First Amendment protects political parody, however, and the Hollywood star may find that becoming a politician means cultivating a sense of humour. The firm, Ohio Discount Merchandise, has a long line of political bobble-heads. Former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani is so pleased with his he takes it to political events.
On NBC's Tonight with Jay Leno, Leno asked First Lady Laura Bush about her husband's claim not to read newspapers. He actually does, she said, but not stories by the reporters that follow him. "Why?" asked Leno. "Because he says he doesn't want to be mad at them the next day. He was there at the event, so he doesn't need to read their coverage of it."