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Liza Willis (update 1) Aug. 31 st , 2004 5:09AM EST Washington Dilby Affiliate ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- With the 2004 Presidential Election around the corner things are not looking so absolute for the Democratic ticket, John Kerry and John Edwards. Dilby.com complies data from various known and unknown polls across the country (including Hawaii and Alaska ), in addition to gathering Internet data from various web-pollers. Dilby.com also factors the previous electoral votes and the 2000 Presidential election to give the public an accurate percentage of who's ahead in the current race. The statistical data gathered averages the popular vote in addition...

Group defends investigation; veterans say comments distorted AUSTIN – Opponents of John Kerry have hired a Dallas-area private investigator to gather information aimed at discrediting his military service, say several veterans who served with the Massachusetts Democrat in Vietnam. Several veterans who have been contacted in recent days accused the private investigator, Tom Rupprath of Rockwall, of twisting their words to produce misleading and inaccurate accounts that call into doubt the medals Mr. Kerry received for his service. "They're just distorting things," said Jim Wasser, who served with Mr. Kerry. "They have nothing to go after John Kerry for, so...

Sen. John F. Kerry [related, bio], torn between the union strength and hometown mayor his campaign desperately needs, might skip a Boston speech tomorrow that could inexorably tilt one of the powerful groups against him. Kerry aides stressed yesterday the Bay State senator has always heeded union pickets - telegraphing a possible bailout strategy to avoid Boston Police Patrolmen Association and other picketers at the U.S. Conference of Mayors event hosted by Boston Mayor Thomas M. Menino. ``He has never crossed picket lines in his time in public life,'' said Kerry spokesman David Wade, adding, however, that no firm decision...

<p>WASHINGTON -- Wesley Clark, the retired four-star general who is running for president, got himself in hot water with his Pentagon bosses more than once in his 34-year military career.</p> <p>Clark matter-of-factly recounts when the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff grumbled that Clark had "one foot on a banana peel and one foot in the grave." Less than a year later, Clark was yanked out of his job as NATO's supreme allied commander.</p>

<p>MANCHESTER, N.H. -- Wesley K. Clark enjoyed a celebrity's reception yesterday on his first campaign visit to New Hampshire, where he followed political traditions by making a lunchtime stop at a diner, taking a walk along this city's main street, and holding a town hall meeting at a college.</p>

Boy, those Howard Dean supporters just won't give John Kerry a break these days - even at a Bruce Springsteen concert. We found this blog on the Mass. for Dean Web site. ``Did I tell you I got in Fenway on Sunday night? 10th ROW!!!!!!! ``You'll never guess who I was sitting next to . . . John Kerry. I never once considered voting for him, but I wish I had a video camera on me to show the world how much of a lame-(expletive) he was at the concert. ``You have to be dead if you're not shaking your...

<p>In the winter of 1974, Howard Brush Dean III departed his family's Park Avenue home and boarded a subway for a gritty stretch of the Bronx. Three years out of college, Dean was seeking purpose, after a year skiing in Aspen and two halfhearted years trying to follow his father's footsteps on Wall Street. At 26, he had a trust fund but few accomplishments.</p>

WASHINGTON - In a summer of political surprises, Howard Dean catapulted to the head of the Democratic Presidential field while President Bush lost his aura of invincibility in Iraq. The fall campaign presents critical tests for both men. An ailing economy and unrest in the Middle East threaten the President's re-election prospects although he remains a relatively popular leader, according to officeholders and activists in both parties who took stock of the 2004 race at the traditional Labor Day break. In more than two dozen interviews, experts said they expect the Democratic primary fight to turn nasty as eight rivals...

<p>Burlington, Vt. - Howard Dean remembers the hot discomfort of the bulletproof vest underneath his suit jacket.</p> <p>In the normally gentle game of Vermont politics, the election of 2000 had become blood sport, a referendum on a controversial bill Dean signed that spring assuring gay couples the same rights as married ones.</p>

<p>To gain an insight into Nixon's views about Kerry, The Globe listened to tape recordings in storage at the National Archives branch in College Park, Md. Kerry's name comes up in numerous conversations. What follows is a partial transcription of four such conversations.</p>

<p>Tt was a comment that had political veterans chuckling last week.</p> <p>Former Vermont governor Howard Dean, they said, seemed to be having a Claude Rains moment, professing himself to be shocked - shocked! - to find tough politics going on in this presidential campaign.</p>

Democrats face trouble, poll shows He may be Florida's most venerable politician, but even U.S. Sen. Bob Graham doesn't have the juice in his home state to overcome the popularity of a wartime president -- at least not now -- a new poll conducted for The Herald and two other newspapers shows. If Graham were the Democratic nominee for president and the election were held today, he would lose to President Bush 52 percent to 43 percent in Florida, the state where Graham has held elected office since the 1960s, served two terms as governor and 17 years as a...

Excerpted Hoping to avoid Republican charges of raising taxes, Sens. John F. Kerry of Massachusetts, Joseph I. Lieberman of Connecticut, Bob Graham of Florida and John Edwards of North Carolina have all proposed to finance their agendas not by repealing the tax cuts already implemented in 2001, but by blocking income tax rate cuts now scheduled for 2004 and 2006. All indications are that the final tax bill expected to emerge from Congress would render that strategy obsolete by advancing all of those tax cuts into 2003 -- locking them into law before any Democrat can claim the White House....

Orangeburg. Presidential candidate John Kerry attempted Monday to light a fire under a lethargic Democratic Party that he said had gotten lazy the past few years. Addressing party activists at a luncheon at Claflin University, the Massachusetts senator urged the party faithful to go out and fight for their beliefs. "The way to do it is to get mad, to get angry, to get active, to get out there and get off your ‘.‘.‘. " he said to prolonged cheers, without completing the thought. "Get going." Kerry's sermonette was prompted by a questioner dismayed by the outcome of the 2000...

Presidential hopeful Howard Dean swoops into South Florida and plucks up campaign funds while praising Bob Graham. MIAMI -- For Howard Dean, the obscure former Vermont governor emerging as a wild card contender in the Democratic presidential race, drumming up Florida support might seem far-fetched. This, after all, is Graham country. U.S. Sen. Bob Graham already has raised $1-million without holding a single fundraiser, and his executive experience in this mega-state makes Dean's look puny by comparison. Dean might be the rare Democratic candidate who opposes the now nearly won war in Iraq -- a popular stance among many Democratic...

WASHINGTON - Introducing himself to a crowd of Democrats gathered in an Iowa home recently, Sen. John F. Kerry joked he comes from Massachusetts, an Indian name meaning ``Land of many Kennedys.'' During his three-day campaign swing last week, the presidential hopeful did not shy away from references to the famous clan that produced the last Bay State Democrat to occupy the Oval Office. In fact, Kerry embraced their liberal legacy and cast himself in the tradition of former presidents from John Adams to Franklin Roosevelt, while also playing up his own dramatic life story. Although some political pundits have...

It will likely be simply one of the thousands of speeches that U.S. Sen. Bob Graham gives in a political career that began in 1966. But if Graham can beat the odds somehow to find the political jet stream and reach the White House next year, his speech Saturday at the Aventura Turnberry Jewish Center will be remembered as his first public appearance in Florida as a presidential candidate. Graham spoke for only 10 minutes before about 200 worshipers in a synagogue that was three-fourths full. He called for rebuilding Iraq and a renewed emphasis on combatting terrorism. The synagogue's...

Senator puts his charitable image on auction block U.S. Sen. John F. Kerry, who was scorched in his 1996 campaign for making only piddling donations to charity, apparently hasn't gotten any more generous since deciding he wanted to become president. At a recent charity event for Holy Name Parish School in West Roxbury, Kerry was among a slew of politicians, businesses and others who chipped in items for a ``Reach for the Stars'' auction. Most of the pols and corporate bigwigs donated expensive dinners, tickets or other valuable items for the auction, which raised money for science and reading textbooks....

North Carolina Sen. John Edwards, who as a Democratic presidential candidate has vowed to honor the National Association of the Advancement of Colored People's take-down-the-Confederate-flag boycott of South Carolina, held a campaign event last weekend "in a Charleston house that once belonged to the South's largest slaveholder," Eric Fettmann writes in the New York Post. "The Edwards campaign dismissed any criticism of the event as 'ridiculous,' insisting that 'this is a national historic landmark,' " Mr. Fettmann said. "So it is — but it's also a symbol. And symbolism is what the whole Confederate flag controversy is about — to...

"These 'Crossfire' co-hosts rarely agree on anything, so Gary Hart seems to have stepped on a land mine with a speech raising questions about war with Iraq: "Tucker Carlson: 'Hart also alluded to dark forces pushing for war in his words quote, "Americans who find it hard to distinguish their loyalties to their original homelands from their loyalties to America and it's national interest." Who do you suppose he was referring to? I think we know, don't we? I think we know exactly he's referring to. He was talking about Jewish Americans.' "Paul Begala: 'That last line was loathsome, it...