August 6, 1999
Web posted at: 4:44 p.m. EDT (2044 GMT)

ORANGE CITY, Iowa (AllPolitics, August 6) -- With about a week before the Iowa straw poll, former Sen. Bob Dole is hitting the familiar Iowa presidential campaign trail for a presidential campaign. Only this time, the beneficiary is his wife.

Sen. Dole, the GOP's 1996 presidential nominee, is campaigning on behalf of the presidential bid of his wife, former Red Cross Chairwoman Elizabeth Dole. As for front-running Texas Gov. George W. Bush, Dole quipped: "He might make a good vice president."

"A lot of people have reservations about voting for a woman. But the issue is her qualifications," said the 1996 Republican presidential nominee, pitching in on his wife Elizabeth's campaign for the 2000 nomination.

With just over a week to go before the Ames, Iowa, straw poll -- a state GOP fund-raiser that many view as the season's first test of candidate strength -- Bob Dole on Thursday invited Iowans on a free campaign bus ride to the Aug. 14 event.

"Hope you're interested enough to make the trip, not for me but for Elizabeth," Dole told about two dozen women gathered in a local pizza joint.

At the same time, he downplayed the exercise's significance.

"Phil Gramm tied me ...and three weeks later he was out of the race," Dole said of the 1995 straw poll. "It'll be forgotten in a couple of weeks."

ROCHESTER, N.Y. (AllPolitics, August 6) -- First lady Hillary Rodham Clinton wrapped up a three-day Senate exploratory campaign trip here Friday with a "listening session" at an arts school in which she attacked the $792 billion Republican tax plan.

It "will cut education in New York by $1.5 billion," she said of the Republican plan which received final passage Thursday. "And that will translate into fewer teachers, fewer children in Head Start, and fewer college opportunities for New Yorkers trying to afford college."

The tax cut could also result in more than 7,200 teachers losing their jobs, and a loss of $141 million in federal money that would have gone to New York schools, she said.

Mrs. Clinton said she hoped people would support her husband's stated plan to veto the GOP tax cut.

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) -- Gov. George W. Bush asked a judge Thursday to dismiss a subpoena for his testimony in a whistle-blower lawsuit by the fired executive director of the Texas Funeral Service Commission.

Bush, the Republican presidential front-runner, said he knows nothing about the February firing of Eliza May. She had been leading the agency's investigation into the embalming practices of Houston's Service Corporation International, owner of 3,700 funeral homes worldwide.

"I have no personal knowledge of relevant facts of the investigation nor do I have any personal knowledge of relevant facts concerning any dispute arising from this investigation," Bush said in an affidavit. He also said he had no conversations with commission officials or the company.

Ms. May's suit alleges that SCI, whose political action committee gave Bush $35,000 in 1996 and 1997, worked with Bush's staff to interfere with the investigation. The defendants are the funeral commission, SCI and Robert Waltrip, the company's founder and chairman.

NASHVILLE, Tennessee (AllPolitics, August 6) -- Bill Purcell, a former Tennessee House majority leader, won a crowded race for Nashville mayor Thursday, and his closest rival has decided against a runoff election.

The unofficial vote tally had Purcell with 47,953 votes, or 48 percent. Former Mayor Richard Fulton followed with 22,704 votes, or 22 percent, and Vice Mayor Jay West had 22,165 votes, or 21 percent.

Nashville requires a two-candidate runoff election when one candidate does not receive 50 percent of the vote, but Fulton said he would not campaign for the post, assuring Purcell's victory in the Sept. 9 runoff.

Purcell, who served in the House from 1986-96, campaigned to become "Nashville's neighborhood mayor." He focused on education and was supported by the city's liberal, labor and business communities.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Friday, August 6, 1999

• Nixon's resignation changed American politics forever
• Clinton, Republicans begin recess battle over tax cuts
• Who Was Deep Throat?
• Bush courts Hispanic votes in Iowa
• Pataki endorses Giuliani in Republican U.S. Senate race
• Video: FEC proposes new campaign Web site rules
• Clinton orders study on policing the Internet
• Fewer Americans know Watergate details, but most say Nixon was right to quit
• Lott says he wants emergency farm aid cut
• Hubbell says Whitewater constituted a probe 'looking for a crime'
• Candidates respond to the House tax relief package
• Gore and son climbing Rainier
• Gingrich outraises his former colleagues
• Joint committee opens talks on juvenile violence, gun legislation
• Congress begins recess, leaving huge spending task for fall
• Feds drop investigation of former congressman, business associate
• GOP leaders backing right to sue HMOs
• Hillary Clinton has Jewish branch on family tree
• Hatch asks Rehnquist to review assignments of Clinton judges
• U.S. Senate passes bill to outlaw 'cybersquatting'
• Architect chosen for Clinton library in Arkansas

• Dole campaigns for Dole in Iowa
• First lady lambastes GOP tax plan
• Bush seeks to have subpoena thrown out in whistle-blower lawsuit
• Purcell to become new Nashville mayor

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