First, my photograph vanished from the Political Junkie blog.

Then, ScuttleButton disappeared.

Now it's my turn. Political Junkie will be on vacation all next week, returning on Monday, Aug. 10.

Sen. Chris Dodd (D-CT), diagnosed with an early stage of prostate cancer, said at a news conference today in Hartford that "I feel fine" and "I'll be fine," and he reiterated that he will stand for re-election next year.

Dodd, 65, will have surgery early next month. "I'll be leaner, I'll be meaner," he said, "and I'll be without a prostate." But he is completely "confident we're going to come out of this well."

The political news for Sen. Chris Dodd (D-CT) has not been good lately, with a former official at Countrywide Financial contradicting Dodd on a sweetheart mortgage deal the senator allegedly received and polls showing more and more people questioning Dodd's honesty and integrity.

Today, at 2 p.m. ET, Dodd is holding a news conference at his Hartford office to announce he has been diagnosed with prostate cancer and that he will undergo surgery during the August congressional break. And, according to the Hartford Courant, Dodd "said he feels fine and intends to run" for a sixth term next year.

More after 2 p.m.

There is little suspense to next week's Senate confirmation of Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court. The only question is whether she gets more than 70 votes.

Here is a listing of the most "no" votes in the Senate against a court nominee since World War II.

Robert Bork -- 58 (rejected 42-58, 10/23/87)
Clement Haynsworth -- 55 (rejected 45-55, 11/21/69)
G. Harrold Carswell -- 51 (rejected 45-51, 4/8/70)
Clarence Thomas -- 48 (confirmed 52-48, 10/15/91)
Samuel Alito -- 42 (confirmed 58-42, 1/31/06)
William Rehnquist (for chief justice) -- 33 (confirmed 65-33, 9/17/86)
William Rehnquist -- 26 (confirmed 12/10/71)
John Roberts (for chief justice) -- 22 (confirmed 78-22, 9/29/05)
Potter Stewart -- 17 (confirmed 70-17, 5/5/59)
Sherman Minton -- 16 (confirmed 48-16, 10/4/49)

The announcement yesterday by Sen. Lamar Alexander of Tennessee that he intends to vote to confirm Sonia Sotomayor for the Supreme Court makes him the sixth Republican to do so -- joining Snowe & Collins (Maine), Martinez (Florida), Lugar (Indiana) and Graham (South Carolina).

Hotline On Call lists other Republicans who in their estimation are "most likely to flip," in this order: Judd Gregg (NH), John McCain (AZ), Kit Bond (MO), George Voinovich (OH) and John Ensign (NV).

I would think all are possible except for Ensign. (HOC acknowledges the Nevada Republican is a "long shot.") Gregg, Bond and Voinovich are retiring next year.

They also say that Democrats Ben Nelson (NE) and Mark Begich (AK) "could buck the party to keep the faith with their conservative home states" by voting no. I say no way. Every Democrat will vote for Sotomayor, a vote that could come on Thursday.

So many questions, so little time.

Will the Energy and Commerce Committee vote on the health care overhaul before the House leaves for the August recess on Friday?

Will the GOP tally in favor of Sonia Sotomayor break double digits?

Will Sgt. Crowley show his birth certificate when he meets the president and the professor for a drink tonight?

As always, we ask the tough questions in this week's episode of our "It's All Politics" podcast.

Credits (as it were) --
Nonstop talkers: Ron Elving and Ken Rudin
Producer: Gisele Grayson
Editor: Cathy Shaw

Some fan mail, much of it written by people other than myself. William Bailey of Queens, N.Y., "loves" the podcast: "You guys make me chuckle on my subway commute." Spud Muther of Minneapolis and David Talley of Raleigh, N.C., are among those who were happy with the fact that Ron and I have been dropping references to Firesign Theater as of late, notably stuff about Nick Danger (Third Eye). The truth is, we've been doing that for years, but our producer always took them out!

And Tom Hickcox wrote the other day, wanting to know who was singing "The Happy Wanderer" at the end of a recent episode. It was New England folk singer Bill Staines.

Wanna subscribe to the podcast? You can do it through iTunes.

Wanna hear previous episodes? Click here.

Wanna be on my weekly mailing list? Sign up at politicaljunkie@npr.org.

Wanna follow my rantings on Twitter? Go to http://twitter.com/kenrudin.

Wanna join me for a beer after the show to talk about race? How about the race for the open Senate seat in New Hampshire? Man, I can talk about that for hours.

In a speech on the Senate floor this morning, Lamar Alexander of Tennessee said he will vote to confirm Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the U.S. Supreme Court -- becoming the sixth Republican to do so.

Alexander acknowledged differences he had with Sotomayor over gun rights and the Second Amendment. But he praised her "experience, temperament, character and intellect."

Alexander, who is not up until 2014, is the third-ranking Republican in the Senate.

In addition to Alexander, the other Republicans who have signaled they will vote to confirm Sotomayor are Snowe & Collins of Maine, Lugar of Indiana, Martinez of Florida and Graham of South Carolina.

The Senate is expected to vote on the nomination next week, perhaps Thursday.

An honest conversation about race, after a round of beers.

Are you kidding?

I grew up in New York City, where one takes the subway if you want to get anywhere. I distinctly remember being on the A train on countless late nights, and many St. Patrick's Days, where folks who have had one too many were not shy about expressing their views about race. It was not pretty. I'm not sure if today's "beer summit" -- involving President Obama, Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates, and Cambridge Sgt. James Crowley -- is the way to go.

Beer makes people do strange things. I clearly recall getting home after a night of beers with some pals and then calling every ex-girlfriend I ever had -- or imagined I had. Many of them hadn't heard from me since the third grade and were appalled to be hearing from me, decades later, at 2 in the morning. A big mistake. I can only imagine what weird things President Obama might do after an evening of beers. Bowling, for example.

Continue reading "The Danger Of Combining Beer With Race (Or Anything)" >

Here are two things we have long assumed about Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison.

One, she will challenge Gov. Rick Perry in next year's Texas gubernatorial primary. Yes, I know, it should be more than just "assumed," but she made similar statements in 2006 and never followed through with it. But this time she appears serious.

And two, because of the challenge, she has been expected to resign from the Senate, perhaps later this fall.

Now the story gets confusing.

Continue reading "Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison Clarifies Resignation Talk, Kinda Sorta" >

The first Political Junkie segment on NPR's Talk of the Nation in the Sean Parnell era. Makes you think.

It also makes us think about the ramifications about the departure of Kentucky GOP Sen. Jim Bunning, the latest bad news involving Sen. Chris Dodd (D-CT), and the arrests of several New Jersey Democratic mayors, which if nothing else complicates the re-election chances of Gov. Jon Corzine.

Join host Neal Conan and me every Wednesday at 2 p.m. ET for the Junkie segment on TOTN, where you can often, but not always, find interesting conversation, useless trivia questions and sparkling jokes. And you can win a Political Junkie T-shirt!

Last week's program -- featuring political columnists Paul Mulshine (Newark Star Ledger) and Tyler Whitley (Richard Times-Dispatch) -- can be heard here.

If your local NPR station doesn't carry TOTN, you can hear the program on the Web or on HD Radio. And if you are a subscriber to XM/Sirius radio, you can find the show there as well (siriusly).

Until we get the kinks out of the new npr.org system -- with apologies to Ray Davies -- there won't be a new ScuttleButton puzzle for at least a couple of weeks. (Read all about it here.)

Lots of supportive tweets on Twitter. Ali Diercks of Bloomington, Ind., calls it a "horrible grievous tragedy." Kris ("Blue Tabbies") writes, "As a consumer, I am outraged." Brian D. Francis of Tehran sums it up best: "The terrorists win."

I'm grieving too. But we still have a new winner to crown for solving last week's puzzle -- which was:

Member Babe Ruth Baseball Club -- Say, did I ever tell you I'm a Yankees fan?

Surf Sex Sin Sharks / PRAY for Rain Snow -- A lot of readers loved this button and wanted to know its history. I have no idea. Does surf lead to sex, which leads to sin, which leads to sharks? And thus we need to pray for rain and snow? Yikes.

Toy for Governor -- Harry Toy lost the Republican nomination for governor of Michigan in 1938.

Lan ... because it's a tough job -- Donald Lan, the New Jersey secretary of state appointed by Gov. Brendan Byrne, sought to succeed Byrne in 1981, but he withdrew from the race prior to the Democratic gubernatorial primary.

So, when you add Babe + Sin + Toy + Lan, you kinda get ...

Babes in Toyland -- which is either a Victor Herbert operetta, a 1961 movie starring Annette Funicello (a ScuttleButton puzzle in itself), or a Minneapolis-based punk rock band.

The winner, selected at random among the correct responders, is (drum roll) ... Ian King of Riverside, Calif.

(And I promise this is a coincidence, but -- speaking of Riverside AND Ray Davies -- one of my favorite Kinks songs is "Sitting By the Riverside." Which you can hear here!)

Check this space in a couple of weeks when, hopefully, ScuttleButton will return.

No surprises.

The Senate Judiciary Committee approved the nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to be an Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court.

All 12 Democrats, plus South Carolina Republican Lindsey Graham, voted yes.

The remaining six Republicans voted no.

Final tally: 13-6.

Some sad news to report.

The new and long awaited revamping of NPR.org, which National Public Radio unveiled on Sunday evening with great fanfare, offers readers a new, clean and easy-to-navigate look.

But with it comes problems with -- gasp! -- illustrating campaign buttons. That's something that affects no one but me.

Thus, until some of the kinks are worked out, ScuttleButton -- my weekly button puzzle that appears in this space every Friday -- will be on hiatus. I'll let you know when it resumes.

The Senate Judiciary Committee meets at 10 a.m. ET to vote on the nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to be an associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court. Only one Republican on the committee -- Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina conservative -- has said he will vote to confirm her, so it looks like the tally will be 13-6.

For those of you who turn to this blog for guidance -- God help those of you who do -- I wrote the following in a July 16 post:

I say the committee will vote 13-6 to confirm.

In interests of full disclosure, however, that prediction was preceded by this:

There's no question that all 12 Democrats will vote for confirmation. I'm guessing that she'll get at least one GOP vote, and I'm thinking it's Orrin Hatch of Utah. Some of my colleagues are inclined to add S.C.'s Graham to that list, but I wonder.

For the record, the last Judiciary Committee vote on a Supreme Court nominee was on Jan. 24, 2006, involving President Bush's choice of Samuel Alito. The committee vote was straight party line: 10 Republicans in favor, 8 Democrats opposed.

In addition to Graham, four other Republicans have said they will support her confirmation, now thought to take place a week from Thursday (Aug. 6): Snowe and Collins of Maine, Lugar of Indiana, and Martinez of Florida.

Sen. Jim Bunning, a two-term conservative Republican from Kentucky who has been plagued by party infighting, poor fundraising and weak polling numbers, announced today he will not seek re-election in 2010.

Bunning in fact blamed his fellow Republicans for standing in his way, with a veiled slap at fellow Kentuckian Mitch McConnell, the Senate GOP leader, who has made it clear for quite some time that he wanted Bunning to retire:

Unfortunately, running for office is not just about the issues. To win a general election, a candidate has to be able to raise millions of dollars to get the message out to voters. Over the past year, some of the leaders of the Republican Party in the Senate have done everything in their power to dry up my fundraising. The simple fact is that I have not raised the funds necessary to run an effective campaign for the U.S. Senate. For this reason, I will not be a candidate for re-election in 2010.

The writing on the wall may have been the news reported Sunday by the Louisville Courier-Journal that more than 100 former Bunning donors have signed up with Secretary of State Trey Grayson, a fellow Republican who has formed an exploratory committee.

Bunning is 77. Grayson, who has taken in twice what Bunning has raised, is 37.

Bunning announced in May that he intended to run for a third term, but as I wrote back then, that decision is "subject to change." And it did.

Bunning is now the sixth GOP senator who won't run again next year, joining Mel Martinez (FL), Sam Brownback (KS), Kit Bond (MO), Judd Gregg (NH) and George Voinovich (OH).

Democrats running for the seat include state Attorney General Jack Conway and Lt. Gov. Dan Mongiardo, who narrowly lost to Bunning in 2004.

/

Sarah Palin's departure as governor of Alaska has elevated Sean Parnell to the state's top post.

Parnell was a state senator representing Anchorage when he was elected lt. gov. on Palin's ticket in 2006. In 2008, with the support of Palin, he unexpectedly took on veteran Rep. Don Young in the GOP primary, which he lost by 304 votes. (Trivia: Parnell's father, Pat, challenged Young in 1980, as a Democrat, and got clobbered.)

Parnell says he will seek a full term in 2010. According to JuneauEmpire.com, Parnell says he will "continue the course" set by Palin.

With 15 months to go before the 2010 midterm elections, CQ Politics, a division of Congressional Quarterly, has released its map and ratings for all 435 House races. The interactive map includes analysis for all competitive races as well as a compilation of previous election results.

And while 15 months is a long way away, what CQ has to say is good news for the Democrats. The "in" party usually suffers losses in the midterm elections -- 2002 (GOP gains) and 1998 (Dem gains) being rare exceptions. Their verdict for 2010: Democrats "appear secure" in the House majority they won in 2006 and added to in '08.

They show, as of now, three Republican House seats in jeopardy: two are leaning Democratic and one clearly favors the Dems.

Illinois 10 -- Republican Mark Kirk is running for the Senate (leans D).

Louisiana 02 -- Republican Anh "Joseph" Cao, who defeated scandal-plagued William Jefferson (D) last year (D favored).

Pennsylvania 06 -- Republican Jim Gerlach is running for governor (leans D).

No Democratic seat is in apparent jeopardy of a Republican pickup, though two are seen as "tossups":

Idaho 01 -- held by freshman Democrat Walt Minnick.
Maryland 01 -- held by freshman Democrat Frank Kratovil.

One GOP district, the soon-to-be-vacant New York 23 seat of John McHugh, President Obama's choice for Army Secretary, is also seen as a tossup for the upcoming special election.

Here is CQ Politics' complete ratings chart for all House seats, as well as the full story.

Once, Sarah Palin was going to rescue the GOP ticket.(Button courtesy of Brendan Kelley, Anchorage Press. / © 2009)

Phase Two of the political meteor known as Sarah Palin ended yesterday, as the Alaska governor, with 17 months left in office, officially quit her job. That the response to her leaving was mostly negative is not a surprise, and it probably says as much about us as it does about her.

In the 332 days since John McCain tapped her to be his running mate, Sarah Palin has endured many different political personas, much of it unfavorable. It's hard to remember that once upon a time, she was the person who was going to rescue the GOP and put McCain into the White House. That was, of course, before the near collapse of the economic system that ended any chance of a third straight Republican victory.

But it was also before Katie and Tina and the debates, when Palin became a caricature.

Still, as the Washington Post's Dan Balz wrote this morning, she embodied a "rise and fall almost unprecedented in modern politics."

The "fall" is what most people are focusing on as she leaves office.

Continue reading "Sarah, We Hardly Knew Ye" >

July 27, 1995:

Some conservatives were never convinced that former White House aide Vince Foster committed suicide.

The focus of the Senate Whitewater Committee is on the despondent note left by former Deputy White House Counsel Vince Foster, whose body was found with a bullet wound to the head in July of 1993.

There is a growing controversy over the White House's role in handling documents belonging to Foster, and some Republicans continue to doubt that he committed suicide, as it has been officially ruled. A Secret Service agent testified that Maggie Williams, the chief of staff to First Lady Hillary Clinton, left Foster's office the night of his death with a stack of folders, a claim that Williams denied.

Today in Campaign History is a daily feature on Political Junkie.

We're out until Monday.

Have a great and safe weekend.

Ken

When people ask you what ScuttleButton puzzle you were looking at right before Sarah Palin quit as governor of Alaska, you'll remember this one!

Hopefully, you won't quit playing my weekly game. And the way to play, for those of you newbies, is to simply take one word (or concept) per button, add 'em up, and, hopefully, you will arrive at a famous name or a familiar expression. (And seriously, by familiar, I mean it's something that more than one person on Earth would recognize.)

And don't focus on a political answer. It doesn't necessarily have to be political, though it could be.

A correct answer chosen at random gets his or her name in this column. Personally, I can't imagine a greater honor.

You can't use the comments box at the bottom of the page for your answer. Send submission (plus your name and city/state -- you won't win without that) to politicaljunkie@npr.org.

Here's the answer to last week's puzzle.

And, by adding your name to the Political Junkie mailing list, you will be the first on your block to receive notice when a new puzzle goes up on the blog. Sign up at politicaljunkie@npr.org. Or you can make sure to get an automatic RSS feed whenever a new Junkie post goes up by clicking here.

Good luck, and happy Friday!

July 24, 1980:

This button commemorates the time when Carter relieved himself on an airport runway in front of the media.

The Senate unanimously votes to set up a panel to investigate Billy Carter's business dealings with Libya. The action comes ten days after the Justice Department disclosed that Carter, brother of President Jimmy Carter, had registered as a foreign agent representing the Libya, well after he received $220,000 from that country's government.

Billy Carter denied any wrongdoing and said he had made a complete disclosure on all his dealings with the Arab nation.

In 1978, he announced he was a friend of Libya and had visited the country, with all expenses paid by the Libyan government. Previous letters from the Justice Department urging that he register as a foreign agent were ignored by the president's brother. A DoJ report released in November of 1980 said that President Carter, despite claims to the contrary, failed to cooperate fully with the investigation.

Today in Campaign History is a daily feature on Political Junkie.

President Obama holds a news conference and manages to convince the American public that, if they really want to understand his plan to overhaul the nation's health-care system, they should listen to this week's episode of our "It's All Politics" podcast.

Also: A delay in the Sotomayor vote, death to the F-22s, and Sarah, we hardly knew ye.

Credits (as it were) --
Nonstop talkers: Ron Elving and Ken Rudin
Producer: Giselle Grayson
Editor: Cathy Shaw

Wanna subscribe to the podcast? You can do it through iTunes.

Wanna hear previous episodes? Click here.

Wanna be on my weekly mailing list? Sign up at politicaljunkie@npr.org.

Wanna follow my rantings on Twitter? Go to http://twitter.com/kenrudin.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid says the Senate won't vote on a bill to overhaul the health-care system until September -- after the August break.

But there won't be much of a vacation for the health-care lobbyists. Their work does not stop.

In three months -- April, May and June -- America's biggest drug makers spent $40 million lobbying Congress on health care. That's the conclusion of an analysis of the most recent lobbying disclosure reports by NPR's Dollar Politics team, Andrea Seabrook and Peter Overby.

The Seabrook/Overby team points out that those three months were critical in the drafting of the current health care proposals floating around Capitol Hill. And it's more than just the amount of cash -- it's what that money bought: people. Phrma alone hired 45 separate D.C. lobbying firms to represent it in those months. Most of the companies that belong to Phrma were also running their own lobbying operations as well, and the biggest ones hired additional dozens of DC firms. It appears there was a critical mass of lobbyists -- all on the side of the brand-name prescription drug companies -- on Capitol Hill at the same time.

You can read more about Andrea and Peter's report -- and hear their piece that airs tonight on All Things Considered -- here.

And here's a great graphic, showing Phrma's lobbying firms.

A Junkie posting yesterday talked about the defeat in the Senate of a proposed amendment by Sen. John Thune (R-SD) that would allow those with concealed gun permits to carry their guns across state lines, assuming the states they were entering also had a concealed gun-permit law.

In the post I wrote the following: "In a victory for gun-control advocates, the Senate voted in favor of the bill 58-39 -- two short of the 60 votes needed."

For that explanation, I was taken to task -- justifiably -- by Paul Weimer. I reprint his comment here:

No offense, Ken, but this sentence is incomplete and misleading. I know it's a shorthand that has regrettably infected even NPR, but what you mean to say is that the bill did not get the 60 votes for cloture. Its not the same thing as defeating the bill at all. After all, 58 Senators voted for a bill cutting off funding for the F-22 and the bill passed.

Paul, of course, is right. If 58 senators voting to kill the F-22 is a defeat for the fighter plane, why would 58 votes in favor of the Thune amendment be seen as a defeat for the pro-gun forces?

I used Beltway shorthand and failed to explain that the 58 votes were two shy of what the pro-Thune forces needed to beat back a filibuster. So while a clear majority of the Senate did indeed support the measure, it was not enough. And thus, a victory for the gun-control forces.

Two Republicans -- Lugar (IN) and Voinovich (OH) voted against it, along with 35 Democrats and two independents. Every other Republican and 20 Democrats supported it. Here are the 20 Dems who voted to pass the amendment (names in bold are seeking election in 2010):

Baucus (MT), Bayh (IN), Begich (AK), Bennet (CO), Casey (PA), Conrad (ND), Dorgan (ND), Feingold (WI), Hagan (NC), Johnson (SD), Landrieu (LA), Lincoln (AR), Nelson (NE), Pryor (AR), Reid (NV), Tester (MT), Udall (CO), Udall (NM), Warner (VA), and Webb (VA).

Lots of questions have been coming in asking about the origin of "Blue Dog Democrats" -- a group of House Dems who are playing a significant role in the negotiations over President Obama's attempt to overhaul the health care system.

Here's how I answered the question back in 2001, when Political Junkie ran on the Washington Post Web site. It came from Russell Lundberg of Chicago:

With all of the media attention on Rep. Gary Condit (D-Calif.), I have heard several mentions of the "Blue Dog Democrats." I've also heard about "yellow dog Democrats" (people who would sooner vote for a yellow dog than for a Republican). Are there any other colored canines out there? Or alternately, what factions exist in Congress currently, and what are some of the more creative names for factions in Congress historically?

You define "yellow dog Democrats" correctly. William Safire's "New Political Dictionary" says that the term goes back to the 1928 election. Sen. Tom Heflin (D-Ala.) bolted the Dems because they nominated as their presidential candidate Al Smith, the governor of New York and a Catholic. While Heflin supported Republican Herbert Hoover, others from Alabama stuck with Smith and popularized the line, "I'd vote for a yellow dog if he ran on the Democratic ticket." This was during the days when voting Republican in the South was considered heresy, a view that lasted -- for the most part -- until Barry Goldwater came along in 1964.

The Blue Dogs are a group of about 30 conservative-leaning House Democrats (including Condit) who came together in 1995 to combat the liberal tendencies of their party. Their name, clearly a play on "yellow dog Democrats," is said to come from former Rep. Pete Geren (D-Texas), who said that the members have been "choked blue" by Democrats from the left. The group's members have become the balance of power in the closely-divided House and are the descendants of a faction of Southern Democrats known as the Boll Weevils, best remembered for their crucial backing of President Ronald Reagan's tax cuts in the early 1980s.

I don't know of any other shades of canine on the rainbow, but there's a group of conservative House Republicans called "CATS" - about 40 or so members of the Conservative Action Team, led by Arizona's John Shadegg. Unlike the real cats and dogs, these groups get along quite nicely. On the other side of the spectrum is a group of liberal Democrats who have formed the "Progressive Caucus." There's also the "Tuesday Group," which is comprised of about two dozen moderate House Republicans, whose ranks once included Jim Jeffords of Vermont.

July 23, 1990:

President Bush nominates David Souter, a U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals judge from New Hampshire, to succeed retiring Justice William Brennan on the Supreme Court.

Souter will be confirmed by a 90-9 vote on Oct. 9.

Today in Campaign History is a daily feature on Political Junkie.

I know, I know. This blog is about politics, and campaigns, and elections. Not music. If you want music reviews, there are other places to go, such as the blog of Rolling Stone, or Pitchfork. I could make an excuse by saying that anyone who sings "Send In the Clowns" must know something about politics, but that's too easy.

The point is this: Judy Collins just spent 50 minutes -- 32 minutes on the air on Talk of the Nation -- mesmerizing us in NPR's Studio 4A here in Washington with her music, her stories, and her voice.

Continue reading "Judy Collins, Live At NPR" >

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), a conservative Republican who closely grilled Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor during the Senate Judiciary Committee confirmation hearings, announces he will vote FOR her nomination.

Graham is the fifth Republican to do so -- joining Snowe & Collins of Maine, Lugar of Indiana, Martinez of Florida. But Graham's vote is the biggest surprise.

The measure by Sen. John Thune (R-SD) that would allow those with concealed gun permits to carry their guns across state lines -- assuming the states they were entering also had a concealed gun permit law -- has been defeated.

In a victory for gun-control advocates, the Senate voted in favor of the bill 58-39 -- two short of the 60 votes needed.

Two Republicans, George Voinovich of Ohio and Dick Lugar of Indiana, voted against the bill.

President Obama holds a news conference tonight at 8 pm ET, his latest effort to sell his health-care plan to a public that, if you believe some polls, is growing more dubious.

And it will be the main topic in today's Political Junkie segment on NPR's Talk of the Nation.

Plus: A week's delay in the Senate Judiciary Committee vote on Sonia Sotomayor, Sarah Palin's final week as governor (let the Sean Parnell era begin!), the F-22 defeat is a victory for Obama, and Robert Byrd returns to the Senate.

Join host Neal Conan and me every Wednesday at 2 p.m. ET for the Junkie segment on TOTN, where you can often, but not always, find interesting conversation, useless trivia questions and sparkling jokes. And you can win a Political Junkie T-shirt!

Last week's program -- featuring Nevada political analyst Jon Ralston -- can be heard here.

If your local NPR station doesn't carry TOTN, you can hear the program on the Web or on HD Radio. And if you are a subscriber to XM/Sirius radio, you can find the show there as well (siriusly).

This question is from Michael Stubbs of Cincinnati, Ohio:

When was the last time, if ever, that a sitting president was not nominated by his party for a second term?

It only happened once to an elected president. That was Franklin Pierce, the 14th president, who was elected as a Democrat in 1852. His pro-Southern sentiments and his policy of failing to lead on the divisive issue of slavery badly hurt his standing with the voters. Especially damaging was his support for the pro-slavery Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854, which backfired on him as Kansas was overrun by pro-slavery forces, mostly from the slave state of Missouri. The events angered Northerners everywhere and helped lead to the creation of the Republican Party. When Democratic delegates gathered in Cincinnati for their convention in 1856, it was clear that they had had enough of Pierce. James Buchanan, who had been defeated by Pierce for the nomination four years earlier, won the nomination on the 17th ballot.

Four other presidents were denied the nomination of their party, but none of these were elected in their own right. They were:

John Tyler, Whig, 1844. Tyler became president in 1841 following the death of William Henry Harrison. Tyler, a conservative Southerner, was out of step with many in the Whig Party, which instead nominated Henry Clay for president.

Millard Fillmore, Whig, 1852. Fillmore also ascended to the presidency following the death of the incumbent. In this case it was Zachary Taylor, who died in 1850. Taylor's death left the Whigs in disarray, and the party convention chose Gen. Winfield Scott over Fillmore and Daniel Webster.

Andrew Johnson, Democrat, 1868. Johnson, a Southerner and a Democrat, was chosen to be part of a Republican unity ticket led by President Abraham Lincoln in 1864. Following Lincoln's assassination the following year, Johnson tried in vain to win the support of the late president's allies; in fact, he was impeached and nearly convicted by a GOP Congress. The Democratic nomination went to Horatio Seymour.

Chester Arthur, Republican, 1884. Arthur was picked for VP by James Garfield in 1880 in order to help the GOP carry New York. Following Garfield's assassination in 1881, Arthur alienated his erstwhile allies by attacking the patronage system that had helped his career until that point. Arthur lost the GOP nomination to James Blaine.

It's pegged as the Democrats vs. the gun lobby, but of course it's more complicated than that.

Today, at noon, the Senate is expected to take up an amendment by South Dakota Republican John Thune that would allow individuals with permits to carry concealed weapons to carry them across state lines -- though only if the visited state laws allow conceal-and-carry permits.

It's part of the fiscal 2010 defense authorization bill, but don't ask me to explain the relevance of having the gun bill attached to it.

Continue reading "Durbin Hoping To Stop Gun Bill, But Reid Is Voting Yes" >

July 22, 1986:

In 1964, Claiborne sought the Democratic nomination for senator in Nevada, losing the primary to incumbent Howard Cannon.

The House votes 406-0 to impeach U.S. District Judge Harry Claiborne of Nevada. While the vote is taking place, Claiborne is in prison for tax fraud.

Appointed to the bench in 1978 by President Carter, Claiborne is the first sitting federal judge ever to be impeached, the 14th federal official to be impeached in history, and the first in 50 years.

Claiborne's attorney, Oscar Goodman, insists the charges are part of a government vendetta.

The Senate will convict Claiborne in October, thus removing him from the bench.

Today in Campaign History is a daily feature on Political Junkie.

They may be pleased it's over in Minnesota, but that doesn't end questions about the prolongued Senate contest. Here's a question from Jess Davis of St. Simons Island, Ga.:

Do you know if Al Franken's case was the longest time between a Senate election and confirmation?

Well, it was the longest since 1975, when the New Hampshire Senate race to replace retiring Republican Sen. Norris Cotton went undecided for more than ten months past election day.

That 1974 Senate race featured a two-vote difference between Louis Wyman (R) and John Durkin (D). The GOP-controlled N.H. Ballot Commission said Wyman was the winner, but the Dem-controlled U.S. Senate refused to seat him. It remained a stalemate until August of 1975, when the Senate declared the seat vacant and called for a September special election, which Durkin won.

Now we have to wait another week before the Senate Judiciary Committee gets to vote on the nomination of Sonia Sotomayor for the Supreme Court.

Fortunately, the wait is over for the latest ScuttleButton winner.

But first things first. You need to know how to play.

Continue reading "We Have A ScuttleButton Winner!" >

From 1995 thru 2006, Tennessee's 9th CD was represented by Harold Ford, pere & fils.

It is a fact of life -- and a fact of politics -- that when talking about campaigns and candidates, the subject of race often comes up. As it should. The election of Barack Obama, believe it or not, has not erased problems of discrimination in this country. Such problems, and their potential solutions, have to be a continuing part of the dialogue.

Sadly, also part of the dialogue are the efforts, by some, to use race as a political tool. Some whites -- such as George Wallace and Strom Thurmond, among others -- established careers as race-baiters. Some blacks have followed suit.

That's when the conversation about race is less instructive and more destructive. And that seems to the way things are in the Ninth Congressional District of Tennessee.

Continue reading "Post Racial America? Not In Tennessee's 9th CD" >

Today's scheduled vote in the Senate Judiciary Committee on the nomination of Sonia Sotomayor for the U.S. Supreme Court has been postponed until next Tuesday.

Republican senators on the committee, as is their prerogative, asked for a one-week delay. Ranking Republican Jeff Sessions of Alabama officially requested the delay, and chairman Pat Leahy accepted it.

The committee will reconvene next Tuesday, July 28.

Sotomayor was endorsed earlier in the day by NARAL ProChoice America, the abortion-rights group. An aide to Sen. Susan Collins said, not surprisingly, that the Maine Republican will vote to confirm Sotomayor. Collins is the fourth Republican who has publicly said she will vote for the New York judge.

July 21, 1981:

In a special congressional election in Pennsylvania's 3rd CD held to replace Rep. Raymond Lederer (D-PA), state Sen. Joseph Smith is the winner. Smith, a Democrat, ran as a Republican after he lost the Dem nomination to David Glancey in May and agreed the next day to run on the GOP line.

Smith was backed by organized labor and former Philadelphia mayor Frank Rizzo, a foe of current mayor Bill Green, who supported Glancey.

The seat became vacant on May 5 when Lederer, who was convicted in the Abscam scandal, resigned.

Today in Campaign History is a daily feature on Political Junkie.

Here are some court- and Senate Judiciary-related questions from readers.

Harry Grinage of Virginia, Minn., writes:

When were the Supreme Court Confirmation hearings first televised?

1981, with Sandra Day O'Connor.

From Jon Cohen of Philadelphia:

Did Supreme Court nominees always testify in person before the Senate Judiciary Committee?

Nope. The first one was Harlan Fiske Stone, in 1925.

And from Brett Sonnenschein of Brooklyn, N.Y.:

I was surprised to find out that Al Franken is a member of the Judiciary Committee since he isn't a lawyer. This seems odd to me since so many senators are lawyers and being on the Judiciary Committee would seem to require a good amount of legal knowledge. Are any other members of the Judiciary Committee non-lawyers?

There was a note in Neil Lewis' article in the New York Times the other day about Franken being one of five senators of the 19-member Senate Judiciary Committee who are not lawyers. Actually, I count six (though I could be wrong). Including Franken, I have Tom Coburn (R-OK), Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), Charles Grassley (R-IA), Ted Kaufman (D-DE), and Herb Kohl (D-WI).

The Senate Judiciary Committee is still scheduled to vote tomorrow morning on the nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to be an Associate Justice for the U.S. Supreme Court. But the minority does have the right to postpone the vote for a week, and that remains a distinct possibility.

Others have suggested that the nomination will be postponed only until Thursday. We may not know for sure until tomorrow morning at 10, when Judiciary is slated to take up the nomination.

For all the talk of the need for bipartisanship, here is how the Judiciary Committee voted on the two Bush nominees in 2005 and 2006.

Samuel Alito: Judiciary Committee approved nomination by a straight 10-8 party-line vote on 1/24/06.

John Roberts: Committee approved nomination by 13-5 vote on 9/22/05. All 10 Republicans voted yes, joined by three Democrats -- Pat Leahy (VT), Russ Feingold (WI) and Herb Kohl (WI).

A question from David Ray of Annandale, Va.:

A Jewish candidate has won one of Minnesota's U.S. Senate seats six elections in a row -- Rudy Boschwitz (R) in 1978 and 1984, Paul Wellstone (D) in 1990 and 1996, Norm Coleman (R) in 2002, and Al Franken (D) in 2008. Is this the longest such streak of Jewish candidates winning one Senate seat since the direct election of senators?

Actually, two other states have had a six-in-a-row victory streak for Jewish candidates in one Senate seat.

New York started it with Herbert Lehman (D) in a special 1949 election. He was re-elected in 1950, and was succeeded in 1956 by Jacob Javits (R), who was re-elected in 1962, '68 and '74.

The other one is current, and it's held by one person. Michigan's Carl Levin (D) was first elected in 1978 and re-elected five times: in 1984, 1990, 1996, 2002 and 2008.

What's most interesting about Minnesota sharing the record is that in three of these races -- 1990 and '96 (Wellstone vs. Boschwitz) and 2008 (Franken vs. Coleman), Jewish candidates ran against each other. Not bad for a state whose total Jewish population is 46,685 out of 5,132,799 -- 0.9 percent. (The national average is 2.2 percent.)

I received a lot of mail, a good percentage of it ugly, over my Friday post about the 40th anniversary of Chappaquiddick -- the shorthand description of the July 1969 accident in which a car Sen. Ted Kennedy was driving went over a bridge, resulting in the death of a young woman, Mary Jo Kopechne.

Much of the mail took me to task for having the insensitivity (their word) of reminding people of the accident as Kennedy is suffering from brain cancer. Others wondered why I would mention this when "what Bush and Cheney did was much worse" (their words). As if one thing had anything to do with the other.

With Kennedy approaching the end of his 46-year Senate career -- the third longest in history -- I was aware that this post might be considered controversial. At the same time, I balanced the post by talking about the Massachusetts Democrat's long career, his political highs and lows, and his legislative accomplishments. Anyone who has been covering politicians for as long as I have knows that there are good and bad in everyone, and to ignore the bad stuff because it might be painful to remember is a disservice to history.

Yes, I did see that many comments -- as well as comments on other blogs that picked up my post -- were quite vituperative about Kennedy. He is not, shall we say, everyone's favorite senator, and I know that. And given what people say on the Web, I guess I should have expected some of the more tasteless things I read. It gave many on the right an opportunity to rant about their least favorite liberal.

But Chappaquiddick happened. Whatever Kennedy has accomplished in his latter years -- and he became a true giant in the Senate -- it was a signficant blot on his record. At the time, it said volumes about his maturity and judgment. More significantly, it cost a young woman her life. It doesn't erase what he has done since. But it's part of the record.

July 20, 1983:

The House censures both Reps. Daniel Crane (R-IL) and Gerry Studds (D-MA) for having sex with teenage congressional pages.

The action was far less severe than some wanted, such as Rep. Newt Gingrich (R-GA), who wanted them both to be expelled.

The ethics committee report said that Crane had sexual relations with a 17-year old female page in 1980, and that Studds, in 1973, had a sexual relationship with a 17-year old male page, though he may have been 16 when the relationship began.

Crane will lose his House seat in 1984; Studds will continue to be re-elected until his retirement in 1996.

Today in Campaign History is a daily feature on Political Junkie.

I was at my first national political convention, the Republican convention in Detroit in 1980. And the rumors were rampant: Ronald Reagan was about to offer the vice presidential nomination to former president Gerald Ford.

And my first thought, which I still remember nearly three decades later: I need to hear what Walter Cronkite has to say about it at 6:30 pm.

Cronkite, the legendary CBS News anchorman, who brought the Kennedy assassination, the moon landing, the Vietnam War, Watergate and the Nixon resignation, and so much more into our living rooms from 1962 to 1981, died this evening. He was 92.

When he retired in 1981, and passed the baton to Dan Rather, it wasn't long before I began looking elsewhere. That elsewhere was ABC News, which I joined in 1983.

But for so many years, whenever there was big news happening, I knew that everything would be clear by turning on CBS at 6:30. Walter Cronkite was our guiding light.

A giant has left us.

Saturday is the 40th anniversary of Chappaquiddick, an incident that has haunted Sen. Ted Kennedy for much of his political career. And it comes at a time when the Massachusetts Democrat may be nearing the end.

 

There is no one currently serving in the U.S. Senate who is as respected as Edward Kennedy of Massachusetts. Despite his unabashed liberalism, he is revered by Republicans as well, for his intelligence, decency and willingness to work across the aisle.

The discovery that he has brain cancer, and is seriously ill, has added to the depth of feelings about Ted.

We do not know how much longer we are going to have him. Strangely, even as we lost Jack at such a young age, and Bobby even younger, the thought of losing Ted Kennedy, even at 77, seems way too soon.

Needless to say, those feelings of respect and reverence were not always there. And they certainly weren't there 40 years ago tomorrow -- July 18, 1969.

Continue reading "Revering Ted Kennedy ... And Remembering The Stain Of 40 Years Ago" >

Let's be honest here. I have more experience doing ScuttleButton puzzles than any Supreme Court nominee in the past hundred years.

For those of you coming to this site with empathy, you should know that the ScuttleButton game is a rebus. Simply take one word (or concept) per button, add 'em up, and, hopefully, you will arrive at a famous name or a familiar expression. (And seriously, by familiar, I mean it's something that more than one person on Earth would recognize.)

And don't focus on a political answer. It doesn't necessarily have to be political, though it could be.

A correct answer chosen at random gets his or her name in this column. Personally, I can't imagine a greater honor.

You can't use the comments box at the bottom of the page for your answer. Send submission (plus your name and city/state -- you won't win without that) to politicaljunkie@npr.org.

Here's the answer to last week's puzzle.

And, by adding your name to the Political Junkie mailing list, you will be the first on your block to receive notice when a new puzzle goes up on the blog. Sign up at politicaljunkie@npr.org. Or you can make sure to get an automatic RSS feed whenever a new Junkie post goes up by clicking here.

Good luck, and happy Friday!

What was unusual about my trivia question in Wednesday's Political Junkie segment on NPR's Talk of the Nation was that nobody called in with the correct answer. And while we revealed it during the program, I thought it might be worth to repeat it here.

I thought of the question watching the American League's victory in Tuesday night's All Star Game. It was the 13th time in a row that the National League failed to win.

So with that in mind, my question was: Which states currently have a winning streak of at least 13 by one party in Senate races?

And here are the answers:

Continue reading "Senate Winning Streaks: Kansas GOP Leads With 28 Straight" >

From the Bronx, a Yankees fan, hates empathy.

But enough about me. It's time for this week's episode of our "It's All Politics" podcast.

Credits --
Nonstop talkers: Ron Elving and Ken Rudin
Producer: Giselle Grayson

Wanna subscribe to the podcast? You can do it through iTunes.

Wanna hear previous episodes? Click here.

Wanna be on my weekly mailing list? Sign up at politicaljunkie@npr.org.

Wanna follow my rantings on Twitter? Go to http://twitter.com/kenrudin.

July 17, 1990:

Lt. Gov. Zell Miller is the leading vote getter in the Democratic gubernatorial primary in Georgia but fails to reach the 50 percent threshold to avoid a runoff.

Miller gets 41 percent of the vote to 29 percent for former Atlanta Mayor Andrew Young, who is hoping to become Georgia's first black governor. Finishing third is future governor Roy Barnes and in fifth place is former governor Lester Maddox. State Rep. Johnny Isakson wins the Republican nomination.

Miller and Young will go to an Aug. 7 runoff, which Miller will win. He will also defeat Isakson in November. Both Miller and Isakson will years later be elected to the Senate.

Today in Campaign History is a daily feature on Political Junkie.

Ostensibly, it's about Sonia Sotomayor. Should she, or not, be confirmed to be an associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court.

But it's much more than that. Democrats know it, Republicans know it, President Obama knows it, and I suspect the nominee does as well. And so does everyone watching the confirmation hearings on television.

Continue reading "Slights, Revenge And, Oh Yeah, Sotomayor: My Confirmation Diary" >

Money doesn't always determine who wins and loses elections, but, at least at this stage of the 2010 campaign, it sends signals. One of the reasons cited by Sen. Roland Burris (D-IL) for his withdrawal last week was his paltry -- $845! -- haul over the first quarter. Of course, there may have been other reasons he decided not to run.

In any event, here are several second-quarter financial updates for some key Senate races:

Continue reading "Moneyball: Portman (R-OH) Shines, Bunning (R-KY) Not" >

July 16, 1992:

Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton accepts the Democratic presidential nomination at his party's convention in New York City.

In a 54-minute speech, he talks about growing up without a father and the values instilled in him by his mother, and lays out the argument against President George Bush.

Earlier in the day, billionaire Ross Perot ends his independent presidential candidacy -- though he will revive it in the fall.

Today in Campaign History is a daily feature on Political Junkie.

Unlike the previous week, there were few reservations with last week's ScuttleButton answer.

But, before we get to the answer and the puzzle's winner, and before having to explain that sorry joke, here's how to play.

Simply check out my button puzzle each Friday. Take one word or one concept per button, add 'em up, and arrive at a familiar saying or a name. (Seriously: a saying that people from Earth might be remotely familiar with.) Submit your answer and hope you're the person chosen at random. That's it!

Oh wait. You MUST include your name and city/state to be eligible.

And also remember, the answer does not necessarily have to be political. For instance, the answer to a puzzle a while back was "Minnesota Twins" -- not political at all, unless you're thinking Mondale and Humphrey instead of Killebrew and Oliva.

Continue reading "We Have A ScuttleButton Winner!" >

Pleitez was one of two major Hispanic candidates who ran in the initial May primary.

The contest to succeed Rep. Hilda Solis (D), who resigned her congressional seat to become secretary of labor, turned out, as expected, not to be much of a contest at all.

With all votes counted in California's 32nd Congressional District, Judy Chu, a Democrat who serves on the state Board of Equalization, took 62 percent of the vote, easily topping Republican Betty Chu, a relative through marriage, with 33 percent, in Tuesday's special election. Christopher Agrella, the Libertarian Party candidate, received five percent.

The district is overwhelmingly Democratic and approximately 62 percent Hispanic. In the initial May primary, two Hispanic candidates, state Sen. Gil Cedillo and activist Emanuel Pleitez, captured 37 percent of the vote between them. Judy Chu, who is Chinese-American, won some key endorsements by Hispanics, notably Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and many members of Solis' family. She led the initial field of candidates with 33 percent.

The victory of Chu -- who becomes the first Chinese-American woman ever elected to Congress -- makes the House lineup 256 Democrats and 178 Republicans. One district, California's 10th, is vacant, following Rep. Ellen Tauscher's (D) resignation to join the Obama administration. Another district, New York's 23rd, will also soon be vacant; the incumbent, Republican John McHugh, has been nominated as secretary of the Army.

So often, in trying to make sense of what passes for politics in this country, we often roll our eyes at some of the antics that go on. Blagojevich in Illinois. Sanford in South Carolina. The long wait in Minnesota. The lunacy in New York.

More and more, Nevada is joining that list.

Between Sen. John Ensign and Gov. Jim Gibbons, Nevada Republicans are taking a beating lately, and they have no one to blame but themselves. Ensign, who vows to stay in office, isn't up until 2012. But Gibbons, whose term expires next year, insists he will stand for re-election. If he indeed does run, and somehow survives the GOP primary, it's hard to imagine the state not electing a Democrat for governor.

Nevada politics is the main subject in today's Political Junkie segment on NPR's Talk of the Nation. Special guest: Nevada political analyst Jon Ralston.

That's not to let New York or Illinois off the hook. The evil Democrats who bolted to the New York GOP last month are now back, welcomed back in fact, by the rest of the Democrats who were ready to burn them at the stake. And Roland Burris, not evil but tragic, has bowed to reality and will not run again in Illinois.

Plus: the politics of the Sotomayor hearings.

Join host Neal Conan and me every Wednesday at 2 p.m. ET for the Junkie segment on TOTN, where you can often, but not always, find interesting conversation, useless trivia questions and sparkling jokes. And you can win a Political Junkie T-shirt!

If your local NPR station doesn't carry TOTN, you can hear the program on the Web or on HD Radio. And if you are a subscriber to XM/Sirius radio, you can find the show there as well (siriusly).

July 15, 1997:

Massachusetts Gov. William Weld (R), whose nomination to become ambassador to Mexico is being held up by Senate Foreign Relations Committee chair Jesse Helms, attacks the North Carolina Republican in an unusual news conference in Boston.

Helms, a strong conservative, has said that Weld is not of "ambassador quality." He expressed strong opposition to Weld's position of supporting the medical use of marijuana and giving needles to heroin addicts. Weld, in today's presser, urges President Clinton not to give in to "ideological extortion."

The White House will continue its support for Weld, but Helms, in refusing to hold confirmation hearings, wins in the end. Weld will withdraw his nomination on Sept. 15.

Today in Campaign History is a daily feature on Political Junkie.

July 13, 1982:

State Assemblyman Matthew "Marty" Martinez (D) narrowly wins the California congressional seat vacated by Democrat George Danielson, who was appointed to the state court of appeals.

Martinez defeats Ralph Ramirez (R) with 51 percent of the vote.

In November, Martinez will face Rep. John Rousselot (R-26th), who was forced into the new 30th CD because of redistricting. Martinez will win, and will hold the seat until 2000, when he is ousted in the Democratic primary by Hilda Solis.

Today in Campaign History is a daily feature on Political Junkie.

Submission of predictions to our Sotomayor Confirmation Contest is now over.

We asked you what you thought the final Senate confirmation tally would be for Sonia Sotomayor being confirmed to the U.S. Supreme Court. With the confirmation hearings beginning on Monday in the Judiciary Committee, the time to have submitted your predictions is now over.

The first person with the exact Senate vote wins a 1976 Jimmy Carter for President bumper sticker -- Carter, because he's the only president who served a full term but never had the opportunity to nominate someone to the Supreme Court.

We're in Aspen, Colo., all week, as I've told you umpteen times. We're here for a station visit to Aspen Public Radio and we're making a whirlwind tour of the surrounding area, talking politics, meeting great people, and thanking those who give generously to public radio.

And what better way to repay them than with a new ScuttleButton puzzle??

For those of you coming to this site for the first time, the ScuttleButton game is a rebus. Simply take one word (or concept) per button, add 'em up, and, hopefully, you will arrive at a famous name or a familiar expression. (And seriously, by familiar, I mean it's something that more than one person on Earth would recognize.)

And don't focus on a political answer. It doesn't necessarily have to be political, though it could be.

A correct answer chosen at random gets his or her name in this column. Personally, I can't imagine a greater honor.

You can't use the comments box at the bottom of the page for your answer. Send submission (plus your name and city/state -- you won't win without that) to politicaljunkie@npr.org.

Here's the answer to last week's puzzle.

And, by adding your name to the Political Junkie mailing list, you will be the first on your block to receive notice when a new puzzle goes up on the blog. Sign up at politicaljunkie@npr.org. Or you can make sure to get an automatic RSS feed whenever a new Junkie post goes up by clicking here.

Good luck, and happy Friday!

July 10, 1989:

Hastings lost the Democratic gubernatorial nomination from Florida in the 1990 primary.

The impeachment trial of U.S. District Judge Alcee Hastings begins in the Senate. The House impeached him in 1988 on bribery and perjury charges.

On Oct. 20, 1989, the Senate will vote to convict and remove him from office, 67-28.

In September of 1992 a federal judge will rule that the Senate had improperly removed Hastings from the bench. Less than two months later, he will be elected to the House from Florida's 23rd CD, becoming the first federal judge to serve in a body that impeached him. He still holds the seat.

Today in Campaign History is a daily feature on Political Junkie.

Question: Is this week's episode of our "It's All Politics" podcast more environmentally sound because we did it from Aspen, Colorado?

You be the judge. Sure, it might appear on the surface to be the the same old same old, with Sarah Palin, Lisa Madigan and the New York Senate the main topics of conversation. But, remember, we're in Aspen. People recycle here. This week's podcast recycled old news and old jokes. It's only fair.

And it can all be found here:

Credits --
Nonstop talkers: Ron Elving and Ken Rudin
Producer: Giselle Grayson

Wanna subscribe to the podcast? You can do it through iTunes.

Wanna hear previous episodes? Click here.

Wanna be on my weekly mailing list? Sign up at politicaljunkie@npr.org.

Wanna follow my rantings on Twitter? Go to http://twitter.com/kenrudin.

It's not a surprise, given his anemic fundraising and polling numbers, but it's still big news: Sen. Roland Burris, appointed by the disgraced then-Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich (D) to fill the Senate seat of Barack Obama, will announce Friday that he will not try to keep the seat in 2010.

Michael Sneed of the Chicago Sun-Times has the exclusive:

The decision by Burris was based on his inability to raise campaign funds; campaign disclosures with the Federal Election Commission are expected to be filed next week ... and he has reportedly only raised approximately $20,000.

State Attorney General Lisa Madigan (D) took her name out of the mix yesterday, but other Democrats have been gearing up to run whether or not Burris was. They include state Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias and Chris Kennedy, son of the late RFK.

The leading Republican contender is expected to be Rep. Mark Kirk. Republicans last won a Senate race in Illinois in 1998, when Peter Fitzgerald ousted one-term Democratic incumbent Carol Moseley-Braun.

July 9, 1985:

David Stockman, President Reagan's budget director who has made many admirers as well as enemies on Capitol Hill for his zealous desire to cut government spending, announces he will step down. Congress is in the midst of trying to cut fiscal 1986 spending by $56 billion, which would still leave a deficit of $180 billion.

Stockman, a former Michigan Republican representative, will be succeeded at OMB by Jim Miller.

Today in Campaign History is a daily feature on Political Junkie.

With the New York State Senate in complete disarray for the past five weeks because of a 31-31 standoff between Democrats and Republicans -- and with the state not having a lieutenant governor to break a tie -- Gov. David Paterson (D) attempted to bring resolution to the matter today by appointing a lieutenant governor.

He is Richard Ravitch, the former chairman of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) who played a crucial role in helping New York survive a major fiscal crisis back in the 1970s.

New York has no LG because of a scandal: Eliot Spitzer (D) resigned as governor last year because of his involvement in a prostitution ring, and Lt. Gov. Paterson automatically moved up to succeed him.

Five weeks ago, when two members of the Democratic majority in the state Senate decided to organize with the Republicans, it moved a one-seat Dem majority to a one-seat GOP majority. And while the two parties were fighting over the legality of the action, one of the Democratic defectors returned to the fold, resulting in a 31-31 tie -- and total chaos in Albany.

Thus the move by Paterson to name a No. 2. Ravitch would stay in office until the 2010 elections.

Republicans, of course, are not thrilled, and they may present some constitutional argument why Paterson doesn't have the power to do this. But it also underscores the fact that there will now be four statewide officials who have been appointed to office without any input from the voters.

Governor -- David Paterson
Lieutenant Governor. -- Richard Ravitch
Comptroller -- Thomas DiNapoli (D). DiNapoli was appointed by the state Legislature in 2007 following the resignation of Alan Hevesi (D), who was convicted of defrauding the government.
U.S. Senator -- Kirsten Gillibrand (D). Gillibrand was appointed by Paterson to fill the vacancy created when Sen. Hillary Clinton became secretary of state.

In all the years that Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich's ethics were under the microscope -- and this goes well before his arrest last year for attempting to sell a Senate seat -- one thing was certain: Lisa Madigan, the state attorney general, (a) wanted to be governor, and (b) would have challenged Blago in the 2010 Democratic primary had he been presumptuous enough to seek a third term.

The political situation obviously changed with the governor's arrest and subsequent impeachment, conviction and removal from office. Blagojevich's ouster elevated Pat Quinn to the governorship, and whatever you want to say about Pat Quinn, his integrity was never in question.

And that became a dilemma for Madigan. The stepdaughter of powerful House Speaker Mike Madigan, Lisa's rationale for running for governor became harder to defend. At the same time, with Roland Burris' tenure as Barack Obama's Senate successor widely seen as a disaster, Illinois and national Democrats were pushing Lisa to run for the Senate -- taking on several Dems in the primary, a list that may include Burris (whose campaign kitty is essentially empty) and state Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias. The word was that the White House was behind a Madigan-for-Senate primary bid. But was that the job she wanted?

Apparently she wants neither. In a surprise announcement today, Madigan, who turns 43 later this month, says she will seek a third term as AG, the "job that I love." No gubernatorial or Senate campaign, at least not in 2010.

Continue reading "Madigan (D) Stays Put In Illinois; Kirk (R) Ready For Senate?" >

July 8, 1987:

The Bork nomination was controversial from Day 1.

Senate Democrats announce that confirmation hearings for Supreme Court nominee Robert Bork, a federal appeals court judge nominated by President Reagan, will begin on Sept. 15. If confirmed, Bork, a strong conservative, will replace Nixon appointee Lewis Powell, considered more moderate.

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Joe Biden (D-DE) says he will curtail his presidential campaign in order to give more attention to the Bork hearings.

On Oct. 23, the Senate will reject Bork's nomination by a vote of 58-42.

Today in Campaign History is a daily feature on Political Junkie.

... And for a good cause: raising money for Aspen Public Radio, an outstanding member station with a phenomenal staff.

No appearance for me on Talk of the Nation tomorrow -- you already got the trivia question! -- but you'll get the same, lame postings from me the rest of the week, including a new ScuttleButton puzzle on Friday.

A response to one of my Sarah Palin posts yesterday, about trying to comprehend her decision to quit, led reader "Cleo K" to comment, "WHAT WAS JOHN MCCAIN THINKING??????"

I'm presuming the writer was suggesting that McCain made a major mistake in picking the untested Alaska governor as his running mate.

Maybe yes, maybe no. What I always found more perplexing is that, according to widespread reports, McCain really wanted Joe Lieberman to be his VP but was talked out of it by his closest advisers.

Continue reading "'What Was John McCain Thinking?'" >

We've come to a crossroads with ScuttleButton.

In the seven months of the Political Junkie blog -- 28 weeks or so of button puzzles -- there's a ScuttleButton rule that I never spelled out. Unfortunately, last week's puzzle forces me to address the issue.

And that rule is, you cannot take part of a word to arrive at one of your answers. In other words, you can't look at a button that says "Frelinghuysen" and come up with the word "Free." That's against the rules.

And as it happens, this affects this week's ScuttleButton winner.

Continue reading "We Have A ScuttleButton Winner!" >

It's official: Vice President Joe Biden has sworn in Al Franken as Minnesota's junior senator.

There are 100 senators: 60 Democrats, 40 Republicans.

Rocky resigned in '73 with a '76 WH bid in mind.

Yesterday's trivia question was this:

Assuming Sarah Palin is quitting the governorship to prepare a bid for the White House, who was the last governor to do so? Who was the last governor to leave office in midterm with the understanding that one of the reasons was to prepare for a presidential campaign?

The answer: Nelson Rockefeller. The New York Republican, in his fourth term, resigned in December 1973, officially to devote himself to his Commission on Critical Choices for Americans -- but, more likely, to prepare to seek his party's presidential nomination in 1976, when Richard NIxon's tenure in the White House would come to an end. Thrice before he sought the GOP presidential nod: a half-hearted effort in 1960 and serious campaigns in '64 and '68. But he was ready to go once more, in 1976.

But, as events played out, Nixon never lasted until '76, which forever changed Rockefeller's plans, and dreams. Enmeshed in the Watergate scandal, Nixon resigned the presidency in August 1974. Gerald Ford, appointed vice president after the scandal-ridden Spiro Agnew quit, ascended to the presidency. He picked Rockefeller as vice president. But that's as close as Rocky got to the White House.

Congratulations to "Mark S" for the first correct response.

July 7, 1981:

No O'Connor button, but here's a rarity: a Potter Stewart for Cincinnati City Council.

President Reagan nominates Arizona appeals court Judge Sandra Day O'Connor to fill the vacancy on the U.S. Supreme Court of retiring Justice Potter Stewart. O'Connor is the first woman ever nominated to the high court.

She will be confirmed by the Senate on Sept. 21 by a 99-0 vote.

Today in Campaign History is a daily feature on Political Junkie.

What her fellow Republicans are saying.

Well, you've seen my still-confused reaction to the Sarah Palin announcement that she's going to resign as governor of Alaska on July 26.

I asked a dozen Republican/conservative movers and shakers to describe how they read her decision. Here are some of their responses:

Continue reading "Exclusive: Republican Leaders Sound Off On Palin Decision" >

Many people think the reason Sarah Palin announced she is quitting the governorship is to pave the way for a presidential bid in 2012.

Other governors, such as Mitt Romney and Tim Pawlenty, decided not to run again, presumably to focus their aim at the White House. But they finished out their terms.

I won't be on NPR's Talk of the Nation this week -- I'm leaving tomorrow for a five-day station visit to Aspen Public Radio in Colorado and will miss TOTN. So I'm offering this week's trivia question instead in Political Junkie. (Sad note: no t-shirt will be awarded for the first correct answer.)

And so the question is ...

Who was the last governor who left office before his or her term was completed with the understanding that one of the reasons was thought to be to prepare for a presidential bid?

You can answer in the comments below. First correct answer gets, well, his or her name mentioned in this blog. Not as exciting as winning ScuttleButton, but it's close.

Maybe, maybe not.

It's hard to be neutral about Sarah Palin; in fact, I don't know anyone who is. And it's hard to find someone who really understands what led to Friday's shocker in which she announced her resignation as governor of Alaska.

It was not unexpected to hear her say she wouldn't seek re-election in 2010. That made sense, as her numbers had drastically fallen back home since she was selected last summer as John McCain's running mate. Plus, she had been feuding with state lawmakers, the budget is in turmoil, and she has gone through the wringer with assorted investigations into her activities (many of them, to be honest, were politically motivated).

While Govs. Bill Clinton and George W. Bush were elected president while still in office, the norm is to be a non-incumbent if you're seeking the White House. Ronald Reagan could have, but decided not to, run for a third term in California in 1974, probably to prepare for a 1976 presidential bid. Mitt Romney opted out of a re-election bid in Massachusetts in 2006 to seek the presidency in 2008. Minnesota's Tim Pawlenty is doing the same in 2010 for presumably similar reasons. (For the record, Govs. Jimmy Carter and Mike Huckabee left office because of term limits.)

But none went so far as to quit in the middle of their term, as Palin is doing (effective July 26). And no one is really sure why.

Continue reading "Forgetting Sarah Palin? How About Trying To Understand Her?" >

Marion Barry, the former mayor of Washington, D.C., and current City Council member, was arrested Saturday evening on charges he was stalking a female companion, his former girlfriend. The Washington Post reports:

Barry's latest run-in with the law centers on his relationship with political consultant Donna Watts-Brighthaupt, who alleges that he continues to approach her even though they split up a few months ago. ... Barry called the charges unfounded and asked prosecutors to drop them.

If convicted of the misdemeanor stalking charge, he could face a year in prison, according to The Post's account.

Barry, who is on probation for failing to pay his federal taxes, has often been in legal hot water during his political career. In 1990, in his third term as mayor, he was arrested on drug charges in a famous "the bitch set me up" videotape and spent six months in prison. He was later elected to the council, the mayoralty, and is currently back on the council.

But this latest episode is likely to hurt his political career.

Haha, I'm just kidding.

Robert McNamara in 1965. Getty Images

 

For anyone who lived through the 1960s -- and can remember it -- the name Robert McNamara was a big part of it.

Secretary of defense during the Kennedy and most of the Johnson administrations, McNamara was the public face of optimism during the buildup of the Vietnam War, a conflict that took nearly 60,000 American lives and untold casualties.

McNamara died this morning at his home in Washington. He was 93.

In his 1995 memoir, In Retrospect: The Tragedy and Lessons of Vietnam, McNamara wrote that by 1967 he had soured on the war. But he continued to express confidence that the leadership of President Johnson would help bring about a satisfactory conclusion to the conflict.

He was president of the Ford Motor Co. when President Kennedy named him to head up Defense in 1961. He stayed on after Kennedy's assassination. Weary of the war and the intense criticism of it, McNamara quit in February of 1968 -- about a month before LBJ announced he would not seek re-election. He was succeeded as defense secretary by Clark Clifford.

He then headed up the World Bank, where his efforts to reduce world poverty were well received.

July 6, 1952:

After weeks of hinting that he would be available for the Democratic presidential nomination, Vice President Alben Barkley goes one step further, announcing he will actively seek the nod. As his campaign button suggests, he is hoping lightning will strike.

The announcement comes just two weeks before the party convention will open in Chicago. President Harry Truman surprised the nation back in March by saying he will not run again.

Barkley, at 74, would have been the oldest person ever elected to the presidency. The leading Democratic candidates are thought to be Sen. Estes Kefauver of Tennessee and Averell Harriman, the Mutual Security Administration director, but the nomination will go to Illinois Gov. Adlai Stevenson.

Today in Campaign History is a daily feature on Political Junkie.

The news that Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, the Republican nominee for vice president in 2008, will not seek a second term next year was not exactly a surprise. Her numbers back home had been in a nose dive since last year's campaign and she's been feuding with legislators of both parties over the budget problems facing the state.

She's also found herself in many controversies away from home: battling with talk-show host David Letterman, giving mixed signals about attending a GOP fundraising dinner in Washington, and being blamed by some unnamed John McCain staffers for the party's defeat last year.

But few expected her to flat-out resign. On the one hand, it could give her more time to prepare for a 2012 presidential run -- while the conventional wisdom is that she still needs to work out her deficiencies to be seen as a serious candidate, polls show her popularity among Republicans still very high.

Or it could signal that she's had enough -- of the attacks and the ridicule she and her family have endured since she was named to the ticket in 2008.

Fourth of July fireworks started a bit early this year.

Just think: The last edition of our "It's All Politics" podcast where we talk about the Minnesota Senate race.

I miss it already.

Plus: The myth of the 60-vote Senate majority, Mark Sanford and John Edwards try to decide which scandal has more of an "ick" factor, Sarah Palin flags a new controversy, and Carolyn Maloney is set to challenge Kirsten Gillibrand in New York -- until Rahm Emanuel shows up with an offer she can't refuse.

And it can all be found here:

Credits --
Nonstop talkers: Ron Elving and Ken Rudin
Producer: Evie Stone

Wanna subscribe to the podcast? You can do it through iTunes.

Wanna hear previous episodes? Click here.

Wanna be on my weekly mailing list? Sign up at politicaljunkie@npr.org.

Wanna follow my rantings on Twitter? Go to http://twitter.com/kenrudin.

This Friday, we celebrate the Fourth of July holiday.

So today, one day early, we celebrate another great American tradition: ScuttleButton.

And here's how to play the game.

It's a rebus. Simply take one word (or concept) per button, add 'em up, and, hopefully, you will arrive at a famous name or a familiar expression. (And seriously, by familiar, I mean it's something that more than one person on Earth would recognize.)

And don't focus on a political answer. It doesn't necessarily have to be political, though it could be.

A correct answer chosen at random gets his or her name in this column. Personally, I can't imagine a greater honor.

You can't use the comments box at the bottom of the page for your answer. Send submission (plus your name and city/state -- you won't win without that) to politicaljunkie@npr.org.

Here's the answer to last week's puzzle.

And, by adding your name to the Political Junkie mailing list, you will be the first on your block to receive notice when a new puzzle goes up on the blog. Sign up at politicaljunkie@npr.org. Or you can make sure to get an automatic RSS feed whenever a new Junkie post goes up by clicking here.

Good luck, have fun, and have a happy and safe 4th.

So Mark Sanford calls his girlfriend his soul mate?

I thought she was from Argentina, not South Korea.

The point being, had he focused on solving the latest ScuttleButton puzzle, instead of opening up his heart to the Associated Press, he might have had a chance of political survival.

But he didn't. And he doesn't. And, as a consequence, someone else is this week's ScuttleButton winner.

Continue reading "We Have A ScuttleButton Winner!" >

July 2, 1964:

Less than a year after the famed March on Washington, Congress passes the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

The Civil Rights Act of 1964 is signed into law by President Johnson, shortly after the House votes to pass it, 289-126. The Senate approved it on June 19 by a vote of 73-27.

Among those voting against it was Arizona's Barry Goldwater, the frontrunner for the Republican presidential nomination.

Today in Campaign History is a daily feature on Political Junkie.

We're all celebrating the Fourth of July on Friday the 3rd this year -- it was our understanding that there would be no math -- and so ... that means ...

This week, ScuttleButton appears on Thursday!

What do Mark Sanford, the conservative Republican, and John Edwards, the populist Democrat, have in common?

Answer: They were both born in South Carolina except for Sanford, who was born in Fort Lauderdale, Fla.

In short, they don't have much in common.

Except this: there's a current fixation on their extra-marital activities.

Or, as they say on cable television, the gifts that keep on giving.

Continue reading "Affairs To Remember: Updates On Sanford, Edwards" >

It's apparently official: Joe the Plumber won't run for office. And you can thank, or blame, God for that.

Writing in the WorldNetDaily blog, Chelsea Schilling tells us that Joe Wurzelbacher is back on the political scene, planning to attend tea parties on the Fourth of July for the purpose of "taking America back." He's going to speak in Conroe, Texas, on July 2 and then in Austin the following day.

But what about a run for office from Joe himself?

It doesn't look like it's going to happen. Said Joe, "I hope not. You know, I talked to God about that and he was like, 'No.' "

Every time you think the political news might start to ease up, there's a week like this. Perfect for the Political Junkie segment on NPR's Talk of the Nation.

The Minnesota Supreme Court rules against Norm Coleman, who concedes his Senate contest to Al Franken.

Mark Sanford gives TMI to AP.

And speaking of tell-alls, a former aide to John Edwards inks a book deal.

Plus: gays and the Obama administration. Promises were made, and some gay leaders say the president has yet to deliver.

Join host Neal Conan and me every Wednesday at 2 p.m. ET for the Junkie segment on TOTN, where you can often, but not always, find interesting conversation, useless trivia questions and sparkling jokes. And you can win a Political Junkie T-shirt!

Last week's segment -- which was interrupted by the Sanford shocker -- can be heard here.

If your local NPR station doesn't carry TOTN, you can hear the program on the Web or on HD Radio. And if you are a subscriber to XM/Sirius radio, you can find the show there as well (siriusly).

July 1, 1972:

Martha Mitchell wanted her husband to quit politics. His resignation as Nixon's campaign manager came too late to save him from prison.

John Mitchell, the former U.S. attorney general, announces his resignation as President Nixon's campaign manager. He will be replaced by former Rep. Clark MacGregor (R-MN), the chief White House adviser on congressional relations and the 1970 GOP Senate nominee against Hubert Humphrey.

Mitchell's decision comes a week after his wife, Martha, tells reporter Helen Thomas of UPI that she will leave him if he does not give up politics. It also comes, coincidentally of course, two weeks after five men, including one employed by the Committee for the Re-Election of the President -- headed by Mitchell -- are arrested in an attempt to bug the Democratic national headquarters at the Watergate office building.

Today in Campaign History is a daily feature on Political Junkie.