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DES MOINES, Iowa – Several Republican officials close to Fred Thompson’s presidential campaign said they expect the candidate will drop out of the race within days if he finishes poorly in Thursday’s Iowa caucus.

Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, surging in Iowa polls in the Republican presidential race, wrote on a questionnaire while running for U.S. Senate in 1992 that homosexuality is "aberrant" and "sinful." "I feel homosexuality is an aberrant, unnatural, and sinful lifestyle, and we now know it can pose a dangerous public health risk," Huckabee wrote in the questionnaire for The Associated Press, which reported the answer on Saturday

Fred Thompson has been acting like he has all the time in the world to get his campaign going, with his aides and advisers saying they wanted to get a first-class organization humming before the “Law & Order” actor steps out for his close-up. One adviser, seeking to calm down an excitable reporter, even pointed out that “there will be two World Series” before the 2008 election. But in fact Thompson – who plans to travel the country with his family in a luxury bus emblazoned with the words “Security, Unity, Prosperity” -- is in a race against time that...

WACO, Texas — A day after announcing he will leave government Aug. 31, an unrepentant Karl Rove said Tuesday that Democrats are headed toward repeating Vietnam-era mistakes that gave Republicans the upper hand on national defense for 30 years. “The Democrats have a problem with national security,” the White House senior adviser said. “Too many Democratic leaders are opposing policies that will lead to America’s success in the Middle East.” In an hour-long interview near the Crawford White House, Rove said congressional efforts to oppose President Bush’s “surge” strategy have clear echoes of Democrats in the early 1970s who cut...

To the surprise of the Bush administration, the House Intelligence Committee voted unanimously Wednesday night to allow all 435 House members to see the classified version of the National Intelligence Estimate on Iraq sent to the White House last week. The report is classified in part because it contains information about sources and methods used in intelligence-gathering. The document will provide fuel for a House debate, scheduled to begin Tuesday, on a resolution of disapproval of President Bush’s plan to boost U.S. troop strength in Iraq. Remarkably, each House member will be given five minutes to speak. The decision to...

In the span of four years, the Bush Administration has been forced to rethink the pre-emptive "Bush doctrine" by which it hoped to remake the world, as the strategy's ineffectiveness was exposed by the very policies it prescribed, TIME's Mike Allen and Romesh Ratnesar report in this weeks cover story on 'The End of Cowboy Diplomacy' on newsstands Monday, July 9th. President George W. Bush came to office pledging to focus on domestic issues and pursue a "humble" foreign policy that would avoid the entanglements of the Bill Clinton years. After Sept. 11, however, the Bush team embarked on...

If the midterm elections were held today, top strategists of both parties say privately, the Republicans would probably lose the 15 seats they need to keep control of the House of Representatives Considering that Vice President Dick Cheney had come a long way to help Florida Congressman Ric Keller raise $250,000 last week, the reception he got in the Sunshine State could have been a bit warmer. After extolling Cheney as "one of the most effective Vice Presidents in the history of the U.S.," Keller launched into all the times he had recently opposed the Bush Administration, including the deal...

What really happened in the brushy South Texas wild that day? How one shot turned a genteel quail hunt into a political crisis? The delicate and the dangerous meet in the ranch lands of South Texas. In the winter, quail gather in the soft gold of prairie sedge, but snakes, scorpions and wild-boar-like javelina lurk too. In 1999 a fourth-generation South Texas rancher named Tobin Armstrong testified before Congress that he sometimes found illegal immigrants dead of dehydration in the unforgiving brush of his 49,300-acre ranch. It was there that Vice President Dick Cheney, out with a hunting party that...

by Mark Finkelstein February 17, 2006 It wasn't enough for Chris Matthews to analogize the Bush administration to a family of Mafia killers. He had to call President Bush "Fredo," the weak brother. Matthews' theory was that Bush was unable to control Cheney's handling of the shooting incident in a manner similar to which Fredo was unable to control his wife. As he amply demonstrated at his press conference today, Harry Whittington is not on life support, but Matthews was working as feverishly as an EMS on a heart attack victim to keep the Cheney story alive. And in doing...

Word of the mishap took 20 hours to get out as the Vice President insisted on telling a local newspaper before everyone else, sources say.The Vice President was the press strategist, and Karl Rove was the investigative reporter. Vice President Cheney overruled the advice of several members of the White House staff and insisted on sticking to a plan for releasing information about his hunting accident that resulted in a 20-hour, overnight delay in public confirmation of the startling incident, according to several Republican sources. "This is either a cover-up story or an incompetence story," said a top Republican who...

First Lady Laura Bush and her daughter Barbara are greeted by Pope Benedict XVI Being a member of the White House Press Pool, especially when you are subject to the strict rules of the Vatican, is not nearly as glamorous as some may imagine. As the print pool reporter for the First Lady's five-day trip to Italy, responsible for sharing my reporting with my fellow journalists in the Fourth Estate, I experienced that firsthand during Mrs. Bush's visit to the Pope Thursday morning and learned the 5 Rules of the Press Pool when you're visiting the Pope. 1) Don't...

http://rawstory.com/news/2005/Exclusive_Time_ABC_reporters_called_out_0209.html The press pool was in the charge of a nun, attired in blue, who could not conceive of ABC’s Ann Compton taking a laptop into the palace. The reporters had been told to bring their stuff with them because they would be running to catch the motorcade as Mrs. Bush departed. “Leave it to a colleague outside,” the nun said insistently. “You don’t need a computer.” “Finally, the nun did away with diplomacy and said, “There is no way.” An Associated Press reporter from Rome (whose uncanny hearing and generosity are responsible for some of the quotes above) asked...

"He was a great President. But boy, they mistreated him. He did what he thought was right." George W. Bush's entry for himself in some future history book? Actually, it was the President describing Abraham Lincoln last week during an epic 100-min. question-and-answer session with 9,000 soldiers and students at Kansas State University. Bush hastened to say he was not comparing himself with that iconic wartime President: "I would never do that." But that's how this President sees himself, according to friends. And last week he began reminding us, selling himself with more vim and certitude than at any other...

Up until a couple of weeks ago, George W. Bush's script to put the misery of 2005 behind him had seemed destined for a smooth rollout. Buoyed by the apparent success of the Iraqi elections, the President would score a quick confirmation victory with Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito, follow it up with a soaring State of the Union address and then return to full campaign mode with a sweep around the country, talking about big issues like immigration and Medicare and throwing the spotlight on a resurgent economy. But the revelation that his Administration has been spying in this...

TIME.com: His Search For A New Groove -- Dec. 19, 2005 -- The President has had a dreadful year, and his approval ratings are anemic. What Bush is doing to try to reverse his second-term slump.No one has written a playbook for the President who is trying to stop a second-term slump before it becomes a long slide to oblivion. The most successful ones in modern times have gone about it in different ways, depending on the forces that were arrayed against them. Dwight Eisenhower, confronting a hostile Congress, made his mark with his veto pen. Ronald Reagan rid his...

After a break of 13 months, President Bush returns this week to frank partisan politicking with a trio of GOP fund-raising stops. Aides say those events are simply a prelude to a heavy schedule in support of Republican candidates for next year's midterm congressional elections. And Bush advisers point proudly to his campaign schedule as proof that PLENTY of Republicans are happy to be seen with the President, despite a few recent snubs from candidates who either passed on the opportunity to appear with him, or indcated that they would rather not do so at the moment. But the GOP...

You have to wonder sometimes why Presidents even run for re-election, given how things usually turn out. Second terms have a way of veering into wild and menacing terrain, spiked with indictments and scandals and betrayal and grief. Some friends become less friendly because they know you are on your way to retirement while they are on their way to the next campaign. Your team gets tired, the ideas stale, and the fumes of power more toxic. It was through those badlands that President George W. Bush trudged last week, and for once he was walking alone. "The problem is...

From the Magazine | Notebook Mike Allen: Why They Can't Hit The Right Note With even Laura off-key on Miers, Bush plans to change the message—again Posted Sunday, Oct. 16, 2005 Get ready for a whole new Harriet. After a disastrous two weeks, White House officials say they hope to relaunch the nomination of Harriet Miers for the Supreme Court by moving from what they call a "biographical phase" to an "accomplishment phase." In other words, stop debating her religion and personality and start focusing on her resume as a pioneering female lawyer of the Southwest. "We got a little...

A story by Mike Allen and R. Jeffrey Smith in the Washington Post on 3 August, 2005, reviewed many of the background documents just released concerning Judge John Roberts, nominee for the US Supreme Court. The article’s title got the subject right, “Judges Should Have 'Limited' Role, Roberts Says.” However, once the authors got into the basis of Griswold v. Connecticut and Roe v. Wade, their understanding of the subject evaporated. The article said, “The new documents disclosed by the archive that reflect Roberts' skeptical views regarding a ‘fundamental’ right to privacy include a lengthy article on judicial restraint that...

In a July 17 story, Jim VandeHei and Mike Allen of the Washington Post had to admit, in recapping White House statements about the Valerie Plame case, that White House spokesman Scott McClellan was usually careful to disavow involvement "in any illegal leak, though his public statements clearly left an impression of a White House aloof to the affair." This is the key to understanding White House statements about the case and the reported White House role. If you read the transcripts of McClellan's briefings, it is clear that McClellan had denied a White House role in a criminal disclosure...