Reid digs deep to display his anti-war efforts

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) just wanted to get across how hard he worked to get Republican votes for a measure that would have set a hard deadline to get American troops out of Iraq in nine months.

Facing a roomful of reporters Thursday, he seemed to think that they didn’t truly appreciate the fact that he really, really tried — even though he ended up a full 13 votes shy of what he needed.

He’d been on the phone for the last three weeks, he said, cajoling senators into supporting the measure. Still, the reporters must have appeared unmoved, because Reid then reached deep to find the words to explain just how much effort he put forth:

“I even called Larry Craig, OK?” Reid said.

Sadly for Reid, the recent troubles of the GOP senator from Idaho had no effect on his reliably Republican voting record. He voted no.

GOP still dreams of finding a presidential heavyweight

You know that the Republican field is in bad shape when party leaders start endorsing people who aren’t running.

It’s no secret that Republicans aren’t thrilled with their pool of candidates for the 2008 presidential election. With one seen as a flip-flopper, another whose coffers are near empty, yet another thought of as too liberal and one who may or may not hunger for the job at all, most Republicans would love nothing more than to welcome another latecomer.

That must be why the opening comments of Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) were such a big crowd-pleaser at the National Rifle Association conference on Sept. 21.

“Walking up to the podium just now, I had a sudden realization. Folks, I have an announcement to make: I think John Sigler would make a spectacular president,” McConnell said.

Sigler, the current president of the NRA, declined to take the bait. Six Republican presidential candidates and one Democratic candidate spoke at the event, either in person or with a pre-recorded message.

Craig spoof hits the airwaves

A man in a suit walks into a public restroom, enters a stall, sits down (with a narrow stance) and then taps his foot twice.

This is not an excerpt from a Minnesota police report but the beginning of a new ad that spoofs the arrest of Sen. Larry Craig to highlight the “disturbing relationship” between senators and agribusiness corporations, according to the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (PCRM).

Instead of being arrested, the man in the video receives bundles of cash from a gigantic pig (not a reference to the police). The message of the ad is that senators are accepting millions of dollars from companies that produce fatty foods and try to grease the system with campaign contributions.

“The real scandal in Washington is the farm bill,” said PCRM President Dr. Neal Barnard. “Senators take millions from corporations that produce bacon, burgers and other fatty foods. Then Congress buys up these unhealthy products and dumps them on our school lunch program. Companies get rich, and kids get fat.”

According to PCRM spokeswoman Jeanne McVey, CNN will begin airing the ad Wednesday in Washington, followed by Atlanta and, of all places, Minneapolis. Maybe weary travelers can soon see it on one of the screens in the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport.

The unBidening of Joe Biden

We are on to you, Joe Biden.

First, our favorite overtalking senator from Delaware started censoring himself in his presidential campaign. In debates, he would literally stop talking long before he was silenced by a moderator.

Then we couldn’t help but notice that he stopped putting his feet in his mouth. Not since February has Biden’s loquaciousness gotten him into trouble. (That one was a doozy, though, when he called fellow Democratic presidential candidate and Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois “articulate and bright and clean.”)

Last week, the fingerprints began to show from what must have been some very powerful coaching sessions.

For example, he recounted on the Senate floor a meeting in which he asked a group of ambassadors: “‘What would you do, gentlemen’ — one lady, the British ambassador, is a woman — I said, ‘What would you do, gentlemen and lady? …’”

Apparently, Biden recently reached the chapter entitled “Always use gender-nonspecific language.”

Suddenly, Biden has become the master of the corrective digression, immediately clarifying that he meant to include women. In another case, he noted the Iraqi Parliament might need some guidance, saying, “My goodness, maybe we should be talking to these guys. And women. Mostly guys, 99 percent.”

So, all right, we get that Biden has to polish up a bit if he is every going to catch up in this brutal presidential race.

We do miss the gaffes, though. Without them, how will we know you, Senator?

‘Most corrupt’ list members keep vanishing

After creating a list called “The 22 most corrupt members of Congress (and two to watch),” one must make haste in releasing it.

That’s because those pesky designees have a way of disappearing.

The Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), a nonprofit watchdog, released its third-annual list on Sept. 18.
It included Rep. Jerry Weller (R-Ill.), who announced on Sept. 22 that he wanted to spend more time with his family and would retire next year.

Yes, the decision was 100 percent about his family, and had nothing at all to do with the list or a Chicago Tribune investigative series of stories that uncovered omissions in his financial disclosure filings.

Sen. Craig, who is one of the “two to watch,” is on his way out the door at month’s end — at least, his Republican leadership hopes he is.
At this pace, CREW can hope to get results like its list did last year. Of the 25 lawmakers who earned the distinction in 2006, 10 are no longer in Congress and eight more are under federal investigation.

But not everybody is impressed by the organization’s work. Rep. John Doolittle (R-Calif.), who is the target of a Justice Department probe and two-time winner of a slot on the list, fought back, informing the local Auburn Journal that he doesn’t like CREW anyway.

“I just really think it’s unfair and wrong for an underhanded and vile organization like CREW, who disagrees with me because I’m a conservative Republican, to attack me on that,” he reportedly said.

Klaus Marre contributed to this page.