The Wall Street Journal-20080130-Campaign -08- Washington Wire - Insight and Analysis From WashWire-com
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Campaign '08: Washington Wire / Insight and Analysis From WashWire.com
Full Text (638 words)Caroline Kennedy Completes an Ad Backing Obama
When Kennedys endorse candidates, they pull out all the stops. Caroline Kennedy penned an op-ed published in Sunday's New York Times endorsing Sen. Barack Obama, and appeared with him Monday at a campaign rally in Washington, D.C. Now, she's being featured in an ad touting his candidacy.
"Once we had a president who made people feel hopeful about America and brought us together to do great things," she says in the ad, as images of her father, former President John F. Kennedy, appear on the screen. "Today Barack Obama gives us that same chance."
Further aligning Mr. Obama with Kennedy, she states: "People always tell me how my father inspired them. I feel that same excitement now. Barack Obama can lift America and make us one nation again."
The ad will air in urban markets including New York City, Philadelphia, Boston, San Francisco and Los Angeles, as well as on national cable, the campaign said.
Sen. Ted Kennedy of Massachusetts also endorsed Mr. Obama on Monday, and he is expected to campaign for the Illinois senator, although a schedule hasn't yet been released.
Yesterday, the Obama camp spent time deflecting charges that he snubbed rival Sen. Hillary Clinton of New York at the State of the Union address Monday night after TV cameras caught him turning his back to her as she greeted Sen. Kennedy.
Mr. Obama shot down that suggestion, telling reporters he was "surprised" by the reaction. "I was turning away because [Sen. Claire McCaskill] asked me a question as Sen. Kennedy was reaching forward," Mr. Obama said according to the New York Times. "Sen. Clinton and I have had very cordial relations off the floor and on the floor. I waved at her as I was coming into the Senate chamber before we walked over last night. I think there is just a lot more tea-leaf reading going on here than I think people are suggesting."
-- Susan Davis
Bush Gives His Support
To Faith-Based Program
After a State of the Union address filled with the political equivalent of comfort food, President Bush plans to spend the rest of the week touting proposals from his speech, including trade deals, and along the way will raise money for Republicans in California, Nevada and Colorado.
He started off the State of the Union tour in Baltimore yesterday, touting one of his favorite items: permanent extension of a law allowing faith-based organizations to compete for federal social- service funds.
The initiative was one of the original elements of Mr. Bush's "compassion" agenda as a candidate in 2000, and creating the first White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives to oversee the effort was one of his first actions as president.
As former Bush faith-based advisers David Kuo and John DiIulio Jr. wrote in a New York Times op-ed yesterday, when it comes to faith- based programs, Mr. Bush "has promised much. It will be left to the next president to deliver on those promises. The good news is that every major presidential candidate seems open to doing just that."
Baltimore's Jericho Program has been a beneficiary of the Bush initiative. Located in a row of modest townhouses, it helps former prison inmates find jobs and also helps them fight addiction. Mr. Bush toured the facility, run by Episcopal Community Services of Maryland.
In the process, he spoke with unusual candor about his fight with alcohol years ago. In a private meeting with clients -- a White House pool reporter was allowed to sit in -- Mr. Bush asked how the men stopped using drugs. He then answered the question for himself. "It starts with the notion that there is a higher power," he said. "It helped me in my life -- it helped me quit drinking."
-- John D. McKinnon
