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The Morning Grind / DayAhead |
Kerry & the 'Kid' ride again
By John Mercurio
CNN Political Unit
 |  Front-man: John Kerry gets into a concert for his campaign at Radio City Music Hall in New York on Thursday. |
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 VIDEO |
 CNN's Kelly Wallace on the VP bounce Edwards gives Kerry.
 CNN's Dana Bash on Bush heading for Pennsylvania.
 CNN's Frank Buckley on Kerry vs. Bush on Iraq policy.
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WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Fueled by a $7.5 million haul last night that featured the requisite Bush-bashing and Whoopi-style bawdiness, John Kerry and John "the Kid" Edwards (per Whoopi) travel today to West Virginia and New Mexico, where the desert air should do wonders for their hair.
Media coverage in New Mexico could be interrupted, we hear, by Dick Cheney, who's set up some satellite chats with local TV affiliates.
Along those lines, B.C.04 pre-butts -- campaign-speak for a before-the-event rebuttal -- K.E.04's trip to North Carolina tomorrow with a pre-attack conference call today at 10 a.m. ET with Charlotte Mayor Pat McCrory.
Camp Kerry has its own call 30 minutes later, a VP roundup led by Cahill/Devine/Mellman --Mary Beth Cahill, Kerry's campaign manager; Tad Devine, a Kerry adviser and Mark Mellman, the pollster.
Back East, Ralph Nader and Howard Dean face off at 2 p.m. ET today at the National Press Club, before a studio audience of 150. We know we're stating the obvious here, but this debate could be really good -- or really boring.
Nader, a press club regular, should enjoy the home-team advantage. Also working against Dean: We hear he took a red-eye flight here last night from San Francisco. The last time Dean took a red-eye before a big event was in January, five days before the Iowa caucuses. He was tired and edgy and ended up barking at an elderly veteran. The rest, as they say, is history.
Speaking of Nader (and Dean, for that matter), TheNaderFactor.com is launching new radio ads Monday calling on Nader to "declare your independence from the right-wing extremists" who are actively funding and organizing his campaign. Tricia Enright, a former Dean spokeswoman and head of the anti-Nader group, said the 60-second ads will run in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; Portland, Oregon; Madison, Wisconsin; Lansing, Michigan; and southern Florida.
President Bush flies to the Lehigh Valley Airport in Pennsylvania where he'll board his campaign bus for a three-city tour. First, an "Ask the President" event at Kutztown University. Next, remarks on the economy at Lapp Electrical Service in Lancaster. (Bush makes 30th Pennsylvania trip)
Finally, a campaign rally at the Toyota Expo Center in York, where the White House is hoping for a crowd of 10,000. (An adjacent hall will hold an equally large crowd attending the Third Annual York U.S. 30 Muscle Car Madness Show.) Bush then choppers back to the White House.
But the real news of the day should come out of the Senate Intelligence Committee, which has released a 400-page report ripping into the CIA's efforts leading up to the Iraq war. About 40 of those pages are "conclusions," unanimously approved by the committee. (Report blames 'group think' for CIA failures)
The "Report on Pre-War Intelligence on Iraq" is expected to conclude that analysts were not pressured to change their views to support arguments for the attack, congressional and other officials told CNN.
But the overall report is being characterized as a damning critique of the CIA's collection of intelligence, sloppy analysis, and reliance on sometimes uncorroborated sources and faulty data -- all of which led the agency to the apparently false conclusion that Iraq possessed biological and chemical weapons.
The report comes two days before CIA Director George Tenet's resignation becomes official Sunday. Tenet's deputy, John McLaughlin, will then take over. (Senators warned on terror threats)
Star-studded celebration
Meanwhile, Better Hair and their wives, who also have great hair, took part last night in a celebrity concert at Radio City Music Hall in New York City, where speakers included Whoopi Goldberg, Jessica Lange, Chevy Chase, Paul Newman and Meryl Streep. (Don't worry, we'll drop the hair thing soon.)
John Mellencamp sang an original tune disparaging Bush called, "Texas Bandito," which portrayed him as an oil-mongering "fortunate son." Mary J. Blige, Wyclef Jean, Jon Bon Jovi and the Dave Matthews Band also performed.
The sold-out event raised an estimated $7.5 million, believed to be the campaign's second largest fund-raiser, behind the DNC Unity Dinner in March -- the one at which Edwards irked Camp Kerry by wiggling his way between Kerry and Clinton.
Kerry and Edwards sat on opposite sides of the hall (Kerry was audience left and Edwards was audience right). Each sat with his wife. Kerry also had Jann Wenner at his side.
|  John Kerry, Teresa Heinz Kerry, John Edwards and Elizabeth Edwards respond to the audience at Radio City Music Hall on Thursday. |
Whoopi Goldberg's comments would probably have earned an "R" rating, at least a PG-13. (Lots of "Bush" references, not all of them about the president.) Whoopi also may have caused the candidates to squirm a bit when she referred to Edwards several times as "Kid."
"Not that you're not youthful. You're very youthful, John," Goldberg said to Kerry. "But he looks like he's 18!"
Kerry took the stage later and responded, saying "I have chosen a man, Whoopi."
Later, the Kerry and Edwards families (not including Jack and Emma Claire, who were not present) were joined by all the artists on stage for a rendition of "This Land is Your Land" during which Kerry played the guitar for the final few verses.
During his interview on CNN's "Larry King Live" last night, Kerry said he would receive a national security briefing on the situation today or tomorrow. Kerry, a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said he's been offered a briefing, but "I just haven't had time." (Teresa cited a lack of time for why she hasn't read Bill Clinton's new book or seen "Fahrenheit 911.")
Sensing an opening, Bush-Cheney fired off this statement last night. "It is a great example of John Kerry's priorities that on the day he said he did not have time to receive his intelligence briefing on threats to America, he found time to attend a Hollywood fund-raiser, filled with enough hate and vitriol to make Michael Moore blush," Bush-Cheney spokesman Steve Schmidt said in a statement.
(Actually, it was a New York fund-raiser; the Hollywood event was last month. But with Republicans gathering in the Big Apple next month, and presumably holding loads of money events, Schmidt was wise to avoid criticizing "New York fund-raisers.")
