WASHINGTON, March 29 (UPI) -- 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.
She's Steele the one -- F.O.B.'s from across America are coming to Washington to meet Clinton scandal figure Julie Hiatt Steele on April 27.
Steele achieved minor celebrity status thanks to her involvement in former independent counsel Kenneth Starr's investigation of possible presidential perjury in the Paula Jones case.
Not surprisingly, these friends of Bill are meeting at West 24, the Washington restaurant partly owned by former Clinton political adviser James Carville. Tickets to the event are now going for $200 but, sponsors say, space is limited and the price may increase without warning.
How exactly is this helpful? -- National Democrats think they have a chance to win the Senate seat being vacated by Sen. Strom Thurmond, R-S.C., who is not seeking re-election in November. They are strongly behind former College of Charleston President Alex Sanders, who they think has a good chance of beating GOP Rep. Lindsey Graham. They are likely as unhappy as some South Carolina Democrat activists are over the news that attorney Tom Turnipseed is considering entering the race as an independent.
According to the Charleston Post and Courier, state Democrats have launched a letter-writing campaign urging Turnipseed to stay out of the race lest he spilt the liberal vote and guarantee Graham's election.
Turnipseed achieved a minor degree of national fame during in the late 1980s, having lost a race some years before in which Lee Atwater, who later became chairman of the Republican National Committee, ran his opponent's campaign. During the race, Atwater made a crude comment about treatment Turnipseed had once received for a mental illness that dogged both men for some time.
Democrat activist Better Aaron of Beaufort has resurrected the comment, for which Atwater apologized while dying of brain cancer, in a letter intended for delegates attending the May 4 state party convention.
"We all remember Lee Atwater saying Tom Turnipseed needs jumper cables to jump-start his brain," the Post and Courier quotes the letter as saying. "Clearly Tom has forgotten how all of us stood by him (in) condemning Atwater for that remark." This classic political move, raising an old charge that is damaging under the guise of another motive, could have come from the Atwater political playbook, as Turnipseed himself acknowledges, telling the paper "The letter smacks of Lee Atwater politics, only this time by Democrats."
New Jersey voters Florio'ed -- Asked about state finances the day after he was elected, New Jersey Gov. Jim McGreevey reaffirmed a central theme of his campaign, telling reporters, "We will have to make difficult decisions ... (but) I am ruling out a tax increase." The promise, a central theme of his victorious campaign over former Jersey City Mayor Bret Schundler, was not long for the world.
In his first budget, released Tuesday, McGreevey proposed tax hikes on cigarettes and corporations, violating his pledge -- although he now says that it applied only to income, gasoline and sales taxes. It should not come as much of a surprise, as he has been edging slowly away from his seemingly blanket declaration since he was elected.
What is a surprise is that McGreevey "muzzled" -- to quote the North Jersey Media Group's Wendy Ruderman -- top officials in his administration, including State Treasurer John McCormac, breaking with tradition and refusing to make them available to answer questions about the budget from the media on the record.
While a McGreevey spokesman did offer to make several officials available to the press after the governor's Tuesday budget address, the press was told that their names could not be used and that television cameras and photographers were not permitted to attend the Q&A session. Dozens of reporters walked out of the briefing in protest.
From the things you never thought you would see department -- As the Thursday lunch rush was ending. Loeb's, a popular New York-style delicatessen located just a few blocks away from the White House, was visited by a group of men clad in olive. Surrounded by Washington reporters and lobbyists dining on the Passover special, the uniforms of the Uzbeki military officers and their U.S. Army companions stuck out like mayonnaise on pastrami. Though the U.S. Army lieutenant colonel who appeared to be in charge of the group couldn't talk about what they were doing, he did agree that -- with U.S. and Uzbeki military officers having lunch in a Jewish delicatessen in Washington during Passover -- the world was indeed a different place.
In memoriam -- Scott Billingsley, legislative director to Rep. Tom Tancredo, R-Colo., died Monday of a heart attack. The 31-year-old was working in Tancredo's district office at the time of his death. His parents, a sister, and his fiancee Katie McNerny survive him.
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