Election Recycling: Election? What Election? Edition
• Kerryfocuses on domestic issues with outline ofClinton-inspired plan to reduce the deficit by lowering spending and raising taxes on the rich; steps away from pledges made during the primary.Kerry: "George Bushstubbornly refuses to change course. When false promises don't work, he tries excuses. Blaming everyone fromBill ClintontoKen LaytoSaddam Hussein."[WP and NYT and LAT ]
•Bad news from Iraq challenges campaigns;Bushcould be war casualty.Kerry: Iraq policy is "one of the greatest failures of diplomacy and failures of judgment that I have seen in all the time that I've been in public life."O'Reilly: "If these people won't help us, we need to get out in an orderly matter."Buchanan: "We have gotten ourselves bogged down in what is clearly a quagmire. What Falluja and the Shiite attacks Sunday tell us is that failure is now an option."Bushurged to tackle the issue. [ NYT and LAT ]
• Kerry: "I think the June 30 deadline is a fiction and they never should have set an arbitrary deadline, which almost clearly has been affected by the election schedule in the United States of America."Bushspokesman: "This is another example ofJohn Kerryplaying politics with the war on terror. The president has made clear that he will not cut and run from Iraq. [ USAT ]
•Vietnam is a new keyword in the Senate chamber.McClellan: Bushspent "most of his morning and early afternoon focused on events in Iraq." [ USAT ]
•Military still dealing with voting snags. [ USAT ]
•MoveOn'sZack ExleyjoinsKerrycampaign. [ USAT ]
[Cosmetic reform. AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais]