Presidential Candidates

There still appears to be a sizable minority in America who favors big news organizations at least in part for their broad ambitions, thoroughness, balance and sense of restraint. But ain't it a shame when those highfalutin', old-school intentions get in the way of the basic mission -- delivering the audience a "Hey Martha!" scoop now and then with their breakfast cereal? It seems the higher values and a healthy dose of old-fashioned incredulity (Could he really be that big a cad?

John McCain has easily won every political race he has run in Arizona, so it is not surprising that Republicans and Democrats alike assumed the senator would hold his own state in the presidential contest. But that was before the economy tanked and foreclosure signs sprouted like saguaro in the desert.

Soon after Sarah Palin was elected mayor of the foothill town of Wasilla, Alaska, she startled a local music teacher by insisting in casual conversation that men and dinosaurs coexisted on an Earth created 6,000 years ago -- about 65 million years after scientists say most dinosaurs became extinct -- the teacher said.

Race has bedeviled this country from the start, when the Founding Fathers ducked the slavery issue for fear of killing the nation in its cradle. Obviously, much has changed. For one thing, Americans are seriously weighing the prospect of elevating a black man to the White House in November. But as this past week's debate over "the race card" illustrates, there is still no subject in American politics as fraught as the color of a candidate's skin.

Memories of 1980 at Occidental College's Haines Hall have the standard fragments of the era: stereos blasting the B-52's through the dorm, pot-fueled bull sessions about the revival of draft registration, late-night cramming for economics exams. That otherwise private nostalgia took on public significance this month when a former Haines Hall resident from Hawaii known at the time as Barry announced that he was forming an exploratory committee to run for president of the United States. U.S. Sen.

Barack Obama's recent surge in the presidential race has been credited to a rise in voters' concerns about their money. It helps that Obama himself has a lot of money. Spurning federal funds -- and the spending restrictions that go with them -- the Democratic nominee has racked up an enormous cash advantage that he is using to dominate the television airwaves.

After all the weighty legal battles and absurdities, nonstop media coverage and national fascination, this year's riveting presidential election has one more spotlight to throw. The electoral college meets today. And Augusta Petrone will be there. Petrone, a 62-year-old housewife, is one of four New Hampshire electors who are to gather at the Concord, N.H., statehouse at 11 a.m. to vote for president. She intends to cast her ballot for President-elect George W.

Gayle Moore, an Iowa nurse, wants U.S. troops "out, out, out" of Iraq as soon as possible. Darleen McCarthy of South Carolina fears that Iraq is turning into "another Vietnam." But when these two Democrats vote in January to help decide their party's 2008 presidential nominee, neither plans to support the self-styled antiwar candidates. Instead, they are siding with the one top contender who voted to authorize the invasion and has refused to apologize for that -- Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton.

Stephanie Burns and Ben Parkinson strolled down sun-drenched Fillmore Street with political thievery on their minds. Both are grass-roots volunteers for Republican presidential contender Ron Paul, a Texas congressman whose libertarian views might seem to make him a tough sell in this legendarily left-wing city.

At 9:15 Tuesday night soap-opera star Nancy Lee Grahn, who plays attorney Alexis Davis on ABC's "General Hospital," stepped in front of a banner that read "Daytime for Gore/Lieberman" and, wearing a long black skirt and pink leather jacket, faced a bank of television cameras. The political gathering for Democratic soap-opera stars had started more than an hour late.

There still appears to be a sizable minority in America who favors big news organizations at least in part for their broad ambitions, thoroughness, balance and sense of restraint. But ain't it a shame when those highfalutin', old-school intentions get in the way of the basic mission -- delivering the audience a "Hey Martha!" scoop now and then with their breakfast cereal? It seems the higher values and a healthy dose of old-fashioned incredulity (Could he really be that big a cad?

Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee broke his silence Monday and defended his decision to support freedom for a convict now wanted in the ambush slayings of four Seattle-area police officers. "If I could have known nine years ago that this guy was capable of something of this magnitude, obviously I would never have granted the commutation," Huckabee said. FOR THE RECORD: Police shooting: An article in Tuesday's Section A about the shooting deaths of four Lakewood, Wash., police officers and another about former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee's granting of clemency to suspect Maurice Clemmons said that Clemmons was released from jail a week before the attack on $15,000 bond.

Team Huck rolls into the bookstore like a NASCAR pit crew, red shirts adorned with the corporate logos of Mike Huckabee's website, his speaker's bureau and his publisher. "Huck" is emblazoned on their epaulets. They strip the protective wrapping off the large lectern that they install at all such appearances. Huckabee doesn't sit at tables. He stands, as a president would, even to sign books. And sign he does: as many as 600 copies of "A Simple Christmas" per hour, racking up even more sales.

President Hamid Karzai said he will not take part in Afghanistan's first major televised presidential debate, leaving his top two challengers to talk between themselves -- if they show up. Karzai, former Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdullah and former Finance Minister Ashraf Ghani had been scheduled to debate today. But after Karzai pulled out, an aide to Abdullah said he might not participate either. Karzai's campaign said he wouldn't take part because more of the 41 presidential candidates weren't invited.

President Obama's campaign fund moved Wednesday to distance him from the burgeoning scandal involving Texas businessman R. Allen Stanford, donating the value of Stanford's $4,600 campaign contribution to a Chicago charity.

Hillary Rodham Clinton has written off $13.1 million in personal funds she lent to her failed presidential campaign, new disclosure reports filed with the Federal Election Commission show. Clinton lent the money in several installments last spring as she fought Barack Obama for the Democratic presidential nomination, a battle she ultimately lost. The former first lady and New York senator has been working to pay off the debt to clear the way for confirmation as Obama's secretary of State.

In his first interview since he became an issue in the presidential campaign, William Ayers, the former Weather Underground leader, said that he had a distant relationship with Barack Obama and that Obama's opponents had turned him into "a cartoon character." Ayers, now an education professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago, said he thought the accusation by Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin that Obama had been "palling around with terrorists" was absurd. "Pal around together?

A day after their worst electoral drubbing in more than three decades, Republicans began a difficult and potentially divisive search for a path out of a dark political wilderness. And with the fall of John McCain and President Bush from the top of the party, a debate is emerging among competing GOP factions over who should pick up the Republican standard. Alaska Gov.

I could not have imagined that less than four years later, he would be elected president. His name was so unfamiliar, I kept stumbling over it during our 45-minute interview about the role of race in his life and in his politics. Was it Barack Obama or Obama Barack? The next morning, unbidden, he called me back. "Hey Sandy," he said. "This is Barack. I've been thinking about what we talked about, and I wanted to add some thoughts."

Even though Barack Obama's grandmother died two days before election day, Hawaii election officials say they will count her absentee ballot. Kevin Cronin, the state's chief elections officer, said Tuesday that state law requires absentee ballots cast by someone who dies before an election to be discarded only if a state death notice arrives before election day. By election day, Madelyn Dunham had not yet appeared on the state health department's list of deceased residents, Cronin said.