Bush backs Hastert; John Kerry backs Laesch

[ProSense]

Bush backs Hastert

President `proud' to stand with speaker during visit

By Mark Silva and Rick Pearson, Tribune staff reporters. Tribune correspondent Mike Dorning contributed to this report from Washington
Posted October 13 2006

President Bush delivered an in-person show of support for House Speaker Dennis Hastert on Thursday and professed optimism for Republicans in next month's elections, but a new Tribune/WGN-TV poll shows a majority of Illinois voters disapprove of the president's job performance and nearly 60 percent are unhappy with the GOP-led Congress.

The survey also shows nearly half of voters disapprove of the way Hastert, of far west suburban Plano, has handled the congressional page controversy that led to Rep. Mark Foley's resignation. Reflecting a potential parochial bias toward a native son, a narrow plurality of Illinois voters say Hastert should not resign as speaker.

The results of the poll, conducted from Sunday to Wednesday, came as Bush traveled to Illinois to raise funds for suburban Republican congressional candidates Peter Roskam and David McSweeney--and to deliver his first personal show of support for Hastert since the page scandal consumed the House Republican leadership two weeks ago.

"I am proud to be standing with the current speaker of the House, who is going to be the future speaker of the House," Bush told several hundred people at an intimate fundraising reception at the Chicago Hilton and Towers on Michigan Avenue.

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John Kerry backs Laesch

October 13, 2006
Beacon news staff

Former presidential candidate John Kerry threw his political weight behind House Speaker Dennis Hastert's Democratic challenger John Laesch Thursday in an e-mailed letter to supporters.

Calling President Bush's visit to Chicago with Hastert a "meeting of the 'no accountability' caucus," Kerry, a U.S. senator from Massachusetts, wrote: "Too late now, Denny. We've had enough. That's why we've added John Laesch, your Democratic opponent and a former Navy intelligence analyst to our October slate of veterans running for Congress."

Snip...

"We're putting together a group of Fighting Democrats, and we really appreciate Sen. Kerry's support," said Laesch's campaign manager, Jennifer Downard, in a statement Thursday. "As a fellow veteran, John Laesch is particularly appreciative of that (letter)."

It is rare for national political figures to publicly support a challenger to Hastert, who has received overwhelming voter support during past elections. However, Democrats perhaps sense potential opportunity in light of the congressional page scandal.

Snip...

Wrote Kerry: "'Woulda. Shoulda. Coulda.' That was Denny Hastert's instinctive response to questions about why the Republican leadership hadn't done more to protect young congressional pages in the Mark Foley scandal."

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[whistle]

1. Please help me out here, does John Kerry really believe he can...

...run as the democratic presidential candidate again in 2008? I think he needs a reality check.

[ProSense]

2. What does that have to do with the OP? n/t

[blm]

3. Yeah - you'd think he got more votes than any Dem in history or something.

Or that he actually beat Bush and now knows the DNC didn't do its job securing the election process for the four years they were charged to do so.

Yeah - no 2006 candidate for congress should even WANT Kerry campaigning for them and raising money - anyone who can get 60 - 65 million votes should just go away. Kerry has been SO useless to this country and never lifted a finger for it - except when he uncovered IranContra, and BCCI, and CIA drugrunning, and wrote that book in 1997 about terror networks, and other useless stuff like that.

[WildEyedLiberal]

4. A) Yes, he can run and win

B) This has what to do with the OP?

You know what's funny? When Kerry goes around the country appearing with and raising money for candidates in 2006, DU says "He's just running in 2008!" If Kerry raised no money for any candidates in 2006, DU would say "He's just selfish! He'll probably run in 2008!"

Really, can this double standard bullshit stop already?

[never_get_over_it]

5. John has a tv ad on his website

PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE if you can send him a few bucks so he can run this ad often

www.john06.com/donate

[madrchsod]

6. obama received more votes

in my area of the 14th than did kerry...kerry will not make any difference. more to the point-why hasn`t obama or durbin weighed in on john`s campaign

[riderinthestorm]

7. That's a fair question but I'm thinking that John will have their support

in hand fairly soon. He seems to be playing his sudden spotlight pretty well if you ask me. I would guess he's already thinking of getting Obama and Durbin on board.

Face it, until 10 days ago, Denny H. was leading the race by something like 30 points - now John has pulled within 10 points. Nobody thought John was going to win, least of all John. He was running to fulfill a promise to his brother who's still in Iraq. I would guess he never imagined his campaign would take off like this and thus never even thought about approaching the big dawgs of Illinois. Furthermore I'm sure he wasn't even allowed to get close enough to them to ask for their support (like Rahm Emmanuel writing him off).

I'm thinking within a week or so, we'll see Durbin and Obama issue a statement of support....