WASHINGTON, Aug. 26 (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.
Not so merry in Maryland -- The upstart campaign of Republican Dave Fischer, a Baltimore attorney who is challenging incumbent Republican Rep. Wayne Gilchrest for the GOP nomination in the 1st Congressional District, is attracting a lot of attention. The Club for Growth, a group that bundles money to candidates who support a pro-growth economic agenda, is reportedly moving as much as $100,000 into the race. After a rocky start 2 years ago, the club is assembling an impressive track record of victories. Seven of the candidates they have backed this cycle in split GOP primaries have finished up the winner.
The race is being build as a conservative vs. moderate-liberal GOP contest. The Fischer campaign has already sent out a number of mailings claiming Gilchrest was 96 percent more likely then his GOP colleagues to vote with Bill Clinton in the former president's last year in office. Now they are following up the mailings with a radio spot voiced by a Clinton sound-alike who praises and thanks Gilchrest for the support.
Why wait? -- The Sexuality Information and Education Council has launched an online campaign to stop further funding of abstinence-only teen sex program by the federal government. President George W. Bush has asked Congress to authorize in excess of $100 million in the next fiscal year to continue such programs in what SIECUS's Tamara Kreinin says is the "(promotion) of a conservative ideological agenda at the expense of sound public health policy, the health and well-being for our nation's youth, and the will of the American people."
The campaign, No New Money, is the result of a partnership with the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, a pro-abortion rights group, and will include the participation of local and state-based organizations. SIECUS argues that the three existing federal abstinence-only programs are "prohibited from discussing contraception or condoms as a way to prevent unintended pregnancy and the spread of STDs and HIV/AIDS, with the exception of their failure rates... (while) no evidence exists to date that these programs are effective at delaying sexual activity or reducing unintended pregnancy or the spread of disease." According to SIECUS, so-called comprehensive sex education programs that include messages about both abstinence and contraception and condoms have been found "to delay sexual activity, reduce the number of sexual partners, and increase the use of contraception and condoms."
Kreinin says the campaign is about bringing open and honest, medically accurate information and education to young Americans instead of what she called "programs that are shame and fear-based and misrepresent the effectiveness of contraception and condoms."
Once more around -- President Bush has tapped former United States Sen. Rudy Boschwitz, R-Minn., to be a member of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Council. Boschwitz, who was born in Berlin represented Minnesota for 12 years terms until Democrat Paul Wellstone defeated him. His family emigrated to the United States in 1933 after Adolf Hitler began his rise to power. In the spring of 1991, Boschwitz traveled to Ethiopia as an emissary for President George H. W. Bush. His efforts resulted in Operation Solomon, which rescued the small black Jewish community living in Ethiopia and airlifted them to Israel.
From generation to generation -- Psychiatrists have for years written about the importance of the grandparent-grandchild relationship to the health and well being of both. Policy makers in Washington and in the states are paying increasing attention to this inter-generational relationship as they craft pro-family policies for the 21st century.
The 2000 Census was the first to include questions about grandparents and the role they may play as caregivers. According to the Census Bureau, 5.8 million grandparents lived with at least one of their grandchildren under the age of 18 in the year 2000. Of those, the number responsible for meeting most of the basic needs -- food, shelter, clothing -- was 2.4 million, or 42 percent of the total residing with at least one grandchild. The bureau says there were 3.9 million multigenerational family households in the United States in 2000, representing 4 percent of total households. Amazingly, almost 2 percent of multigenerational households included grandparents and great-grandparents, as well as the children and grandchildren of the grandparents.
Personnel notes -- Keith Hennessey joins the White House staff as deputy assistant to the president for economic policy and as deputy director of the National Economic Council. Hennessey, who had been in the office of Senate Minority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss., replaces Marc Sumerlin, who departed Aug. 16. ... The White House has announced the president's intention to appoint six new trustees to the board of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts ,including former New York Republican state Sen. Roy Goodman and Alma Powell, the wife of Secretary of State Colin Powell. Also name to the board are: Maryland's Melvyn J. Estrin; George Farias and Beatrice Welters of New York; and Catherine Reynolds of Virginia.
Got a Capital Comment? E-mail [email protected].
