The Note

ByABC News
October 27, 2003, 9:39 AM

W A S H I N G T O N, Oct. 24&#151;<br> -- Today's Schedule (all times Eastern):

9:00 am: Senator Joe Lieberman addresses the National Latino Police Officers Association, D.C.9:30 am: Senate convenes for legislative business10:00 am: House convenes for a pro forma session10:30 am: General Wesley Clark visits a learning center, Salem, N.H. 11:00 am: Senator John Edwards attends SEIU Local 199's "Dignity Congress," Miami 12:35 pm: Vice President Cheney delivers remarks at a Bush-Cheney 2004 fundraiser, New York City1:00 pm: Senator John Kerry holds an economic event, Seacoast, N.H. 2:00 pm: Congressman Dick Gephardt attends the UAW CAP conference, Des Moines 2:00 pm: Congressman Dennis Kucinich holds a press conference, Portsmouth, N.H. 3:00 pm: Congressman Kucinich visits a retirement center, Exeter, N.H. 3:30 pm: Congressman Gephardt participates in a roundtable discussion on health care and tax cuts, Des Moines 3:35 pm: Governor Howard Dean appears on the Mitch Albom radio show 3:45 pm: Congressman Kucinich meets with students at a teen center, Exeter, N.H. 4:30 pm: Congressman Kucinich meets with student activists, Exeter, N.H. 5:00 pm: Congressman Kucinich attends a campaign office opening, Portsmouth, N.H. 6:00 pm: Congressman Gephardt meets with Madison County Democrats, Winterset, Iowa 6:30 pm: Vice President and Mrs. Cheney attend a private Bush-Cheney 2004 fundraiser, Ellis Island, N.Y.7:00 pm: Congressman Kucinich attends a public forum, Exeter, N.H. 8:00 pm: Congressman Gephardt meets with Adair County Democrats, Greenfield, Iowa

NEWS SUMMARY

Another day, another Note, and another humble and microscopic attempt to gently recalibrate The Filter to make sure that everyone feels they are being treated fairly.

Let's see: the Republicans are more than likely to nominate George W. Bush as their standard bearer next summer, and the Washington press corps daily covers both his campaign and his government with intense intensity and relentless relentlessness.

"Get off the president's back!" is about the nicest thing a certain class of POTUS supporters say in e-mails to The Note, seeing in our work, they say, the same harsh negativity and anti-Republicanism that they believe infuses the entire dominant media.

There are too many stories even to list today that would have been bombshells for an Administration that was once-upon-a-time focused on secrecy, discipline, collegiality, and success.

The New York Times suggests Republicans on the Hill and at the White House are down on Rummy (you must-read that); on the front, the Washington Post suggests George Tenet's pre-war intelligence was not so good; inside, the Post 's Pincus does his Sy Hersh imitation and says the NIE was "hurriedly pulled together"; we could go on.

The upside for the Democrats who (for some reason) want the president's job (and the scrutiny that comes with it) is that the mistakes that they make (and those made by their campaigns) are given 1/800th of the attention by the media than that given the White House.

The crack RNC research/communications shop well that is a different matter. They pay CLOSE attention to the other side.

And today's papers, on the Friday before the Sunday when the nine current Democratic presidential candidates gather in the Motor City to both debate and witness once again (as if more proof were needed) that Gwen Ifill is one of the finest political journalists America has ever produced, check out the confusion, infighting, disarray pervading the Grand Young Party:

-- The Los Angeles Times' Brownstein writes on the Democratic presidential candidates "whose a real Democrat?" intraparty battle. LINK

-- Advice to the DNC: never cross a Boston mayor. Those guys play for keeps.

The Boston Globe 's straight-from-central-casting Frank Phillips says that Mayor Menino and the DNC aren't totally in sync on the convention. We can't decide which we like more: the blind quotes or the on-the-record ones! LINK

-- The Nashua Telegraph 's wonderful Kevin Landrigan drops General Clark into New Hampshire's still-swirling Tyco Bermuda Triangle, with a front-page story that the Clark campaign will see as unfair, but the Granite echo chamber is already echoing. LINK

-- The General and the Bay State junior Senator both get to deal with their favorite topic the Iraqi war resolution big time today.

The New York Times ' Halbfinger writes on Kerry and the war and the Boston Globe 's Scott Lehigh does General Clark and the war and they are only must-reads if you wish to keep daily tabs on which candidate can accumulate more pretzelian Iraq war positions by the night of the Iowa caucuses.

Halbfinger charitably doesn't mention Kerry's recent claim to have secret information about the UN and the war, and/but he makes two essential points (amidst his letting Kerry's tortured words hang out there): LINK

1. Kerry's fundamental position on the war (when he doesn't deviate from it) is actually historically and intellectually consistent (but also non-bumper-stickerable).

2. Howard Dean's position on both the resolution and the WMD were in fact not as clear and consistent and anti-war as Dean would like us all to believe, and the press has done a horrible job with that.

Lehigh gets an exclusive interview (two, actually) with Swetty General Hosswhisperer, and comes up with this: LINK

"Clark says he didn't know what was in the resolution because he wasn't paying close attention. But had he been in Congress, he would have been aware of the details, and, having known them, his preference for patient internationalism, plus his suspicion of the administration's motives, would have led him to oppose the resolution."

So as you get ready for the debate, remember that in all likelihood, one of the six top contenders will before too long be the second-most prominent/dominant figure in American politics, and will ascend accompanied by quite a bit of baggage that will suddenly take on a presidential air (and they won't like that at all).

Campaigns be forewarned!

While it's no "Hardball: Battle for the White House," there is a political discussion today at 4 pm at Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government that's sure to make some noise.

The Shorenstein Center's Alex Jones will moderate the "Election 2004: The Pundits on Politics" panel made up of the New York Times Magazine's Matt Bai, New England Cable News' Allison King, USA Today 's Susan Page, and ABC News' Mark Halperin.

Things could get rough there, but in a educational and collegial kind of way.

President Bush returns to the White House today. We imagine he has a heap of expense reports to fill out after that trip. He heads to Camp David this afternoon.

The Democratic presidential candidates will get together on Sunday in Detroit for their fourth DNC-sanctioned debate.

This one is sponsored by Congressional Black Caucus Institute, who already sponsored a debate last month in Baltimore that wasn't DNC-approved. The venue is the historic Fox Theatre in downtown Motown.

The one and only Ms. Ifill will moderate the debate (broadcast exclusively on Fox News Channel) with Fox's Carl Cameron and Detroit Fox anchor Huel Perkins asking questions too. At last report, the format was still being discussed, but we hear it will be pretty straightforward.

Governor Dean calls in to the Mitch Albom radio show today. He campaigns in New Hampshire on Saturday and in Detroit on Sunday before the debate.

Senator Kerry is in New Hampshire today and tomorrow. He's in Detroit on Sunday.

General Clark is in Boston and New Hampshire today. He's in New Hampshire again tomorrow and in Detroit on Sunday.

Congressman Gephardt is in Iowa today and tomorrow. He campaigns in Detroit on Sunday before going to the debate.

Senator Lieberman is in D.C. today and tomorrow. He's in Detroit on Sunday.

Senator Edwards campaigns in Miami today. He's in South Carolina and Oklahoma on Saturday and in Detroit on Sunday for the debate.

Congressman Kucinich campaigns in New Hampshire today and tomorrow. He's in Detroit on Sunday for the debate.

Ambassador Moseley Braun has no public events today. She campaigns in Wisconsin and Illinois on Saturday and she'll be in Detroit on Sunday for the debate.

Reverend Sharpton has no public events today. He's in D.C. tomorrow and in Detroit on Sunday.

The politics of national security:It has not been Donald Rumsfeld's week for staying out of the news. As his State Department counterpart passes the plate in Spain and the National Security Adviser stands by the president in Asia, Rumsfeld stays stubbornly In the News.

From America's Paper to the Paper of Record, another DOD must-read.

The New York Times ' Jehl and Firestone report congressional Republicans are getting fed up with being ginned by Rummy's "high-handedness and lack of respect." LINK

Mark this sentence: "One senior Republican Congressional official said that he himself had concluded that Mr. Rumsfeld's approach was doing harm to the White House and that he had become "a millstone around the president's neck."

And this one: 'The worst thing that can happen in Washington is if you're a cabinet member, you think you're bigger than the president,'" says an unnamed Republican.

For his part, The Don goes on the offensive defending his memo to the Washington Times . Rumsfeld says he "intended to 'inject a sense of urgency' into top leadership" and that "a lack of cooperation among government agencies has made long-range strategic planning difficult." The Secretary also tells critics to quit their carping on post-war planning, "'There was a great deal of planning, and it was good planning,' he said, noting that a State Department official's assessment that planning was poor reflected a 'personal' complaint." LINK