UPI's Capital Comment for June 6, 2002

Capital Comment -- Daily news notes, political rumors and important events that shape politics and public policy in Washington and the world from United Press International.

If my enemy is the friend of my friend ... -- Sen. Bob Smith, R-N.H., is in the midst a difficult primary campaign against Rep. John Sununu, R-N.H., son of Bush 41's White House chief of staff. A number of conservative organizations and their leaders are strongly behind Smith because of his strong respect for the rights of the unborn but his endorsement by one Bush 43 Cabinet member has left some of them wondering.

Last week, Christine Todd Whitman, the former governor of New Jersey and current director of the Environmental Protection Agency, gave strong approval to Smith's re-election. While the two generally see eye-to-eye on environmental issues -- both hew to the left -- Whitman is seen as one of the leading proponents of abortion-rights within the GOP. As governor, she vetoed a bill that had passed both houses of the state's GOP-controlled legislature to ban partial-birth abortions, on the grounds that it was a restriction on a woman's right to choose. The move earned her the enmity of many in the GOP, some of whom very publicly held their nose while working toward her re-election in 1997. So the Smith-Whitman alliance is, in the minds of some, a curious development.

Oh, him -- Tongues in Washington are wagging over the identity of "the bureaucracy" to which President Bush referred when 'dissing' his own administration's report to the United Nations on the issue of global climate change. Sources who follow the issue say "the bureaucracy" is really Phil Cooney, the chief of staff to the White House Council on Environmental Quality who, some say, spent four months quietly rewriting the Climate Action Report to keep the pro-Kyoto spin put on it by the remnants of the Clinton/Gore administration still in place at EPA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

The report, which critics say is based total on junk science, includes some data in violation of a settlement between the feds and a government watchdog group, so there are several more shoes likely to drop on this one.

A Barr to electoral success -- The Libertarian Party, content to enhance its role as political spoilers, has put forward a list of races where they hope to tip the balance of power between the Republicans and Democrats. Among those targeted is Rep. Bob Barr, R-Ga., for defeat, urging party members to vote for Rep. John Linder, R-Ga., in their inter-member primary and for the Democrat in the general election should Barr win in the first round. The Libertarians say they are coming at Barr over his opposition to drug legalization, a move that the congressman says is dictated by certain party interests in Washington rather than from the grassroots back in Georgia. Philosophical soul mates like Chuck Muth, leader of the Republican Liberty Caucus -- a libertarian group inside the GOP -- think the move foolish, especially in light of how Barr has taken on the Bush administration over the proposed infringement on American civil liberties as part of the war against terrorism. Muth says the RLC has endorsed Barr for re-election and is encouraging anyone who shares his libertarian perspective to stick with Barr regardless of the dictates of the Libertarian Party hierarchy.

Nita lift -- Democrats are feeling good about their chances to defeat House Budget Committee Chairman Rep. Jim Nussle, R-Iowa, in the newly drawn 1st Congressional District. In Tuesday's primary, former Bettendorf, Iowa, Mayor Ann Hutchinson defeated former U.S. Rep. Dave Nagle, D-Iowa, to win the right to take on Nussle in the fall. Rep. Nita Lowey, D-N.Y., the chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee trumpets Hutchinson's defeat of Nagle -- a former Lowey congressional colleague saying, "As mayor, Ann Hutchinson took the city of Bettendorf from a $4 million deficit to a $4 million surplus. As chairman of the House Budget Committee, Nussle took the country from record surpluses to record deficits. With more than half of the 1st District new to Nussle and given Hutchinson's support from Democrats, Republicans, and Independents across the district, Hutchinson is well positioned to defeat Nussle in November. Hutchinson's opponent in the primary, David Nagle, ran a good race and we look forward to all Iowa Democrats uniting together to unseat Nussle in the fall."

Here come the judge -- Harking back to the days when the case of Elian Gonzales captivated the nation, American Bar Association President Robert E. Hirshon is calling for changes in detention, representation and legal proceedings for children who arrive in the United States without their parents.

Speaking at the Immigration Judges' Conference in Puerto Rico, Hirshon said that the 5,000 foreign-born children who arrive unaccompanied each year are "often denied adequate legal representation, and are held in juvenile jails where they are commingled with juvenile offenders, and often subject to strip searches, shackles and handcuffs." More than 200 immigration judges from 52 U.S. immigration courts are estimated to be in attendance at the conference. Hirshon wants the judges to adopt a "best practices" regime for dealing with unaccompanied children including the establishment of formal juvenile dockets with a designated or rotating judge and allowing judges to question children before pleadings to ensure their ability to understand the proceedings.

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