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Lots of Surrogates

By Mark Kilmer Posted in Face the Nation | FOX News Sunday | Late Edition | Special Features | This Week — Comments (0) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »

Sunday, March 2, 2008.

On FNS, Diane Feinstein blurted that Hillary has been "tested by the anvil of [her husband's] White House [in a male-dominated society] for eight years." Dick Durbin called for her to quit the race if she doesn't win big on Tuesday.

Next on FNS, Karl Rove talked about John McCain matching up against Barack Obama. He pointed out that using Obama's middle name could backfire on McCain, as it is seen as "going too far." He advised those who want to help McCain not to do it.

On TW, Howard Wolfson and David Axelrod behaved like brats. The best part, I thought, was when Barry's guy Axelrod compared his candidate's Rezco scandal with Whitewater.

On MTP, Tim Russert held another Matalin-Carville-Murphy-Shrum roundtable. They talked a lot about the Dem race and seemed to agree that Hillary had to win Ohio and Texas then go on to win Mississippi, Pennsylvania, and North Carolina. Murphy said she still wouldn't have the delegates. Mary Matalin reminded that Puerto Rico, which holds its contest in June, has 63 delegates. (Never mind.)

On FTN, Bob Schieffer talked to Hillary surrogate Evan Bayh and Obama surrogate Chris Dodd. It was the usual divisive squabble, but Schieffer seemed most concerned about Bayh's admission that, as a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, he had been told that it was not a question of IF al Qaeda attacks the U.S. again, but WHEN they do. Schieffer wanted to know if Bayh had any idea when, and Bayh told him that it was common knowledge that al Qaeda would attack again.

Next up, Schieffer had the bearded Bill Richardson, who refused to endorse anyone but said that he is "tired of the bickering" like that we'd heard between Bayh and Dodd.

On LE, Wolf Blitzer first talked to Obama surrogate John Kerry. Kerry said the usual stuff, but the funniest part was when he expressed concern that people would hear the telephone ringing in Hillary's commercial and mistake it for their own phone. He also claimed that Obama has more foreign policy experience now than what Ronald Reagan had when he was sworn-in in 1981.

Hillary supporter and House Intelligence Committee Chairman Silvestre Reyes was next up on LE. He said that he saw no Obama momentum in Texas, citing an El Paso County commissioner who had switched his support from Obama to Hillary. He also said that the House would pass FISA within a week.

House GOP whip Roy Blunt was next up on LE. He wants to pass FISA, he said, but he lacks Reyes's optimism. Blitzer wanted to know what kind of "message" it sent to the world, that Ahmadinejad could meet with the Iraqi government. Blunt said that it showed that the Maliki government was not a delegation of U.S. puppets.

Read More for the show-by-show review. …

DURBIN AND DI FI ON FNS. Senators Dick Durbin, an Obama supporter, and Diane Feinstein, Hillary's California girl, talked to FOX News Sunday host Chris Wallace, and it was typical of this constant rat-a-tat-a-tat of the hired guns, the surrogates, yapping back and forth.

Wallace played about two seconds from the Hillary commercial asking whom America wishes to save the children by answering the phone at 3 AM. Feinstein said: "I know Hillary is tested and ready." As proof, she offered that Hillary has been endorsed by three dozen flag officers. Now, Obama had answered the commercial by pointing out that Hillary answered the phone at 3 AM and decided to invade Iraq, but Feinstein reminded us that Hillary's vote on the Iraq invasion came after days of careful deliberation by the Senate, not from some early AM phone call. She added that Hillary is qualified because she is married to President Bill; she's been "tested by the anvil of a White House for eight years."

Wallace played a clip of Obama accusing Hillary of "fear mongering." Durbin said that it doesn't matter if you're awake for the 3 AM phone call; rather, it's the judgment you use on the phone once you understand what is being said. He said that Obama used the right judgment on Iraq. (He wasn't serving in the Senate, thus he wasn't called, Dick.)

Durbin wants Hillary out of the race. He declared that if she doesn't do well on Tuesday, "I hope she makes an honest appraisal of her chances." Wallace asks if it will hurt Obama if she does not quit, and Durbin reported that everyone wants the Democratic Party to be united and to win. He admitted that he knows Obama "better than any other elected official." (Did Durbin help to "create" Obama's political persona?)

KARL ROVE ON FNS. Host Wallace next talked to Republican strategist Karl Rove. The interview dealt with how best John McCain could run against presumptive Dem nominee Barack Obama.

Rove warned that John McCain needs to treat Obama's words as if they were serious, not as mere empty platitudes. McCain, he said, should also point out the gap between the rhetoric and the reality.

McCain, Rove argued, needs to create an image of himself as a "reform-minded leader." On Iraq, when Obama starts talking about the cost of the war, Rove says McCain needs to make clear the cost of leaving the planet's third largest oil reserves to the whims of al Qaeda or of Iran.

What will matter, Rove declared, was the state of the economy this Fall, and he's not sure if Obama's isolationist, populist campaign will work in the general elections.

Rove argued that, despite Obama's protests to the contrary, "every Presidential election is about change… the future rather than the past."

Karl Rove thinks that using Barack Obama's middle name, Hussein, would turn into a negative for McCain, as it "goes too far" and people see it as going too far. If you want to help McCain, he argued, don't do it.

On Tuesday's contests, Rove conceded the possibility that Hillary could possibly do well in Ohio, but then he'd have to see how she did with the popular vote in Texas. He added, though, that it would be a mistake for Obama to call on her to drop out.

WOLFSON AND AXELROD ON TW. Word is that Howard Wolfson, from Hillary's camp, and David Axelrod, from Barry's, are friends in real life. They did not act it this morning on ABC's This Week with George Stephanopoulos. Actually, they behaved like children and somebody should take away their yummy candy bars.

Axelrod, when talking about Barry endorsements, pointed out that Jay Rockefeller had endorsed Obama. Both Rockefeller and Obama opposed the war, he pointed out. Wolfson countered that when Obama got in the U.S. Senate, he did nothing to stop the war. Wolfson added that Obama chairs the Senate National Security subcommittee on European Affairs and that he his subcommittee has held no hearings as Obama has run for President. Axelrod countered that Obama asked some tough questions of Condoleezza Rice at her confirmation hearings before becoming Secretary of State.

Wolfson promised that Hillary will release all of her tax returns "on or around April 15." Axelrod proclaimed that Obama has talked "to both papers [the Sun Times and the Tribune of Chicago]" about his Rezco stuff. Wolfson argued that Obama refuses to release information on his Rezco real estate transactions, and Wolfson countered that he thought the Clintons would be the last people to raise a stink over a real estate transaction. In effect, then, Obama's guy compared his candidates Rezco problems with the Clintons' Whitewater scandal. (Who's going to take the McDougal fall for Barry?)

MTP STRATEGIST ROUNDTABLE. Here was Tim Russert again chatting with Bob Shrum, James Carville, Mary Matalin, and Mike Murphy. First, Russert showed a bunch of polls, including breakdown by sex and racial category. Russert asked Carville what they tell him, and Carville said nothing. Murphy said they show a close range, but he wants to know how many young people show up. Bob Shrum said something, but it came across as a series of buzzes and clicks. He compared Hillary to the Beach Boys and Obama to the Beatles. Matalin said that she would tell Hillary that "she can't close the deal." Murphy, his hair looking disheveled, said that what Hillary "has working for her is the near-death-experience." (Comeback kid, blah, blah.)

Carville said that Hillary has to win somewhere to change the momentum. If she wins Ohio and Texas, he said, "there's not a single person in Pennsylvania who's going to say, 'We do not want to weigh in on this.'" (Sorry, Jim, but I don't want to weigh in on this. I don't want the commercials. I don't want the candidate visits from those two or, gawdforbid, William Jefferson Blythe.) Murphy suggested that if she wins Ohio and Texas on Tuesday then takes Pennsylvania next month, 60-40, she still won't have enough delegates to clinch it. Shrum suggested the superdelegates "swinging back her way." He said she was to win Pennsylvania "convincingly" then North Carolina (May 6) and Mississippi (March 11), even though Mississippi is before Pennsylvania. It's the Dems' calendar, but Shrum doesn't know the dates and probably would lose the thing, which is why he's on the sideline this year.

Matalin pointed out that Puerto Rico has 63 delegates. That's on June 7.

It would be a fine thing if this thing kept going, while McCain stashed his money and grinned.

DODD AND BAYH ON FTN. On CBS's Face the Nation, venerable host Bob Schieffer also did the surrogate thaang: Dodd for Barry, Bayh for Hillary. Bayh liked Hillary on SNL last night. Schieffer played Hillary's 3 AM phone call, children asleep, commercial. Bayh does not think the commercial is "fear mongering." He said that he said he sits on the intelligence committee, and they told him "the other day" that it is not question of IF we'll be attacked by al Qaeda but WHEN. Schieffer asked him who had told him this, and Bayh said that the intelligence community has stated it publicly. Schieffer seemed astounded by this, asking if our intelligence community has any idea when this attack is going to happen. Bayh said no, but it is common knowledge that they'll try again.

Dodd, down in Texas campaigning for Barry, said that Barry would prevent that attack. He said that Barry is "eminently qualified," because Dick Lugar took him to Russia. He said that "life experience, where you come from, background" counts more than number of years in the Senate and with your husband in the White House.

Schieffer played Obama's commercial retort which says that he'll answer the phone because he knew that the danger was al Qaeda in Afghanistan and not Iraq.

Bayh countered that the Dems have two great candidates.. He credited Obama with giving a speech opposing Iraq, but he pointed out that Obama said that he didn't know how he would have voted if he had been in the Senate and since he has joined the Senate, his voting record is "nearly identical" to that of Hillary.

Dodd said that the Dems have two good candidates and he hopes the Dems race does not become divisive. He said that these commercials were divisive.

BILL RICHARDSON ON FTN. The only relevant question for Richardson, and it is not very relevant anyway, is whether he would endorse Hillary or Barry before Tuesday's Texas primary where Hispanic voters supposedly might be influenced by his word.

For today, a bearded Bill Richardson said: "Not right now."

He's tired of the "bickering" like that which went on between Bayh and Dodd. He said that after Tuesday, the party should settle on the candidate with the most delegates and "come together and see where we are and move on toward the general election."

HO. HUM.

KERRY ON LE. On CNN, Late Edition host Wolf Blitzer brought us John Kerry for Obama. Blitzer asked Kerry what happens if it's a spit on Tuesday, and Kerry said that this is up to the Hillary campaign. He added that if Hillary doesn't win big, she can't catch up and should "look at the reality."

Kerry said that if the superdelegates take over and pick the candidate, "it would violate the grassroots" of the party. "It would be very fractious and difficult for the party." Wolf asked him why not just get rid of the superdelegates, and Kerry said that this might be an outcome. He told Blitzer, erroneously, that the superdelegates were added to the Dem nominating process after McGovern ('72) and Dukakis ('88). They were added after 1980 to prevent Teddy Kennedy from taking the nomination from Fritz in '84.

John Kerry expressed concern that those who hear Hillary's 3 AM telephone commercial are going to mistakenly think that their own phone is ringing. (I'm not kidding, folks.)

John Kerry said that Barack Obama comes to the race with more experience in Foreign Policy than Ronald Reagan had, which is another lie.

REYES ON LE. Hillary's supporter, House Intelligence Committee Chairman Silvestre Reyes (D-Texas), had to convince Blitzer that it was not all over for her. Reyes said that "not only can she win [Texas], I think she will win." He does not see any Obama momentum in Texas, pointing out that an El Paso county commissioner recently switched his support from Obama to Hillary. He thinks there is a "real possibility" that this could go to the convention.

Blitzer played a clip of President Bush chiding Congressional Dems on FISA. Reyes said that House passed their version last November but the Senate didn't pass their version until last month. He accused the Senate of trying to force the House to accept their version by passing it just before the act expired.

Blitzer played a clip of National Intelligence Directory Mike McConnell saying that the U.S. is less safe today because we've lost our ability to monitor terrorists, what with the House delaying passage. Reyes said that it did not harm our ability to monitor, but that "hopefully in the next week," they'll be able to bring the new bill to a vote.

BLUNT ON LE. Blitzer's next guest was House Republican Whip Roy Blunt of Missouri, seated at a small, round, glass table in the DC studio. (Wolf, of course, was in Miami.) Blunt says he's "not quite that optimistic yet" that the House will pass then new FISA in a week. He pointed out that we're not as safe as we were, because the original 1978 FISA law was writ for old tech. We need the authority, Blunt argued, to intercept foreign terrorist communications as it happens, not after applying for and receiving a warrant.

Wolf showed Blunt a clip of Iranian President Borat receiving "the red carpet treatment" in Baghdad. He asked if this is why we went to war in Iraq, to allow them to meet with the Iranians. Blunt explained that we went to war to allow Iraq to have a free government and free governments are allowed to do what they want in meeting with their neighbors. Wolf asked him what kind of message it sends, and Blunt answered that it shows that the Maliki's government is not a puppet of the U.S.

Blitzer played a clip of Chuck Hagel using the old "overburdened" canard. Blunt responded that things are getting better in Iraq and he likes to see the political progress taking place now.

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Those were the Sunday Shows. Have at it!