Michigan may yet upset the primary calendar more than any other move this year by holding a Jan. 15 primary that would pressure New Hampshire and Iowa, and further compress the nominating schedule.
The Detroit News' Charlie Cain and Mark Hornbeck report Democratic activists last week struck a "tentative accord" to hold their primary on Jan. 15 -- or at least three days after the New Hampshire primary slated to be on the 12th or earlier. The Michigan GOP's chair said his party would vote the same day as Democrats. The Democratic governor supports the date, but the Legislature still must approve it and the House speaker said nothing had been finalized yet. More should be known before Wednesday when the state Senate is expected to vote on legislation concerned with the primary.
Michigan Democratic Party chair Mark Brewer denied there was even an agreement to hold a primary, let alone move the date up. This was contradicted by the governor's spokeswoman who confirmed on her behalf that there was a call discussing the move. "But other sources involved in the talks said a deal was reached, adding that the setting of the date must appear to be driven by the Legislature in order to avoid national party sanctions for going too early." Both parties want a closed primary that requires voters to "request a specific party's ballot. The state would keep no record of the vote, but the political parties would." This is to prevent crossover votes that both parties felt they were burned with: Republicans with John McCain in 2000 and Democrats with Jesse Jackson in 1988.
Yesterday Democrats debated in Iowa and they mostly went after Barack Obama, writes The Politico's Richard Allen Greene. The first question was "Is Barack Obama ready to be president?" No candidate except Mike Gravel rose to defend Obama and Hillary Clinton "revived an argument left over from the last debate about candidates’ willingness to meet with the leaders of hostile nations." After the dust cleared, Obama "brought down the house" by saying "Well, you know, to prepare for this debate I rode in the bumper cars at the state fair."
Bloomberg's Heidi Przbyla reports that Clinton, Obama and John Edwards all agreed that "pulling U.S. forces out of Iraq can't be accomplished in just a few months and that any withdrawal must be balanced by security concerns." These opinions were mostly in opposition to Bill Richardson's desire to withdraw virtually all forces in six months. Edwards said it would be hard to move out that quick. Clinton said, "It is so important that we not oversell this." Obama said, "George Bush drove the bus into the ditch and there are only so many ways you can pull that bus out of the ditch"
On the Republican side, The Politico's Jonathan Martin reviews Rudy Giuliani's recent reticence to speak about his family and religious faith and reports that his "calculus is obvious. He has been married three times and cheated on his second wife. His children have publicly distanced themselves from him. If and when he attends Mass, he can’t take communion because his second marriage was not annulled. And he contradicts church teaching by backing abortion rights. Naturally he’d rather talk about the taxes he cut as mayor." GOP pollster Tony Fabrizo said two-thirds of the party believe religion is "essential to living a good and moral life, it's very difficult to see how you communicate what your values are without explaining what they’re based upon." Part of Giuliani's problem has been the previous two presidents: Bill Clinton's openness about his marital problems and George W. Bush's public professions of faith.
Rural Iowans are trying to see if the "big city" Giuliani really fits in with the "little guys," as one man put it according to Adam Nagourney's New York Times story. Giuliani's campaign style and New York-ness have tried to adjust to Iowa with varying successes.
Meanwhile, in an interview with the Associated Press Fred Thompson said "Don't confuse the lawyer with the client" in response to revelations he's lobbied on behalf of an abortion-rights group and murderous Haitian president Jean-Bertrand Aristide . On abortion, Thompson said that in the Senate he opposed the particular group on "every matter that came up." Thompson said he doesn't recall lobbying the White House on Aristide's behalf in 1991 and also that Aristide "had the support of the United States of America, George Bush. He had the support of the Organization of American States and he was deposed by a dictatorship."
Lastly, John McCain is rebuilding his South Carolina staff after going from a dozen full-time paid staffers and a handful of consultants in the spring to four paid staffers and unpaid volunteers this month. In the next two weeks the campaign doubled its paid staff with four new hires, all of whom will directly target voters.
Get these and today's other election stories at RCP's Politics and Elections page.
