WASHINGTON, D.C., 5 Ocotber - "AND WHEN YOU see it up close, smell it, and realize the loss of life and the devastation, it is first incomprehensible, but it gives you even further resolve to try to do your best, your dead-level best to do the right things."
- House Minority Leader Richard A. Gephardt, Missouri Democrat, emerging from a meeting with President Bush on Wednesday after visiting the former site of the World Trade Center
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RSVP, send deposit
NOW THAT THE Democratic National Committee has decided to raise funds again, it's official. Al Gore will headline the New Hampshire Democratic Party's Jefferson-Jackson Day dinner Oct. 27. "Celebrating Our Democracy" is a main event on the fund-raising circuit way up there in Super Tuesday land.
And there are some funds involved: $75 gets dinner alone, while $500, $1,500, $2,500 and finally the $5,000 "Gold Sponsor" ticket fetches various degrees of coziness with the former vice president. It was not always so. In Iowa last week, the former vice president rented a car and motored around the prairie, stopping for coffee with the locals and chatting up DNC reps via cell phone.
Gore is not the only New Hampshire fan. In future weeks, Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry, and Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman of Connecticut will visit the Granite State. Both Democrats are possible contenders for the 2004 presidential race, though Lieberman said he will drop out of the race should Gore decide to run.
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Thinking back
THE NEW YORK POST offered this assessment of President Clinton, calling Monday's disbarment from the Supreme Court "one more stain on a sad legacy. Never mind Monica. Never mind the impeachment. America is living - day to day, and for many years to come - with the former president's fickleness regarding international terrorism, too.
"Clinton promised to track down the architects of bombings at the World Trade Center (1993), Khobar Towers (1996), American embassies in Africa (1998) and USS Cole (2000) - and he didn't. This sent a signal that US interests at home and abroad were open to attack.
"The Clinton administration also determined that the CIA should not use sources that had 'dirty hands' - i.e., individuals with possible criminal or human-rights violations in their past.
"Soon it had no significant sources at all. In other words, the man's lack of self-control caused him to ignore his primary responsibility - keeping America and its citizens safe. And the price for that irresponsibility is being paid now."
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Looking for a bachelor's pad?
THE POLICE MUST KNOW the place inside out by now. Nevertheless, Rep. Gary A. Condit is selling his apartment. The California Democrat wants $130,000 for the top-floor condo in chichi Adams Morgan in Washington, D.C. The place boasts high ceilings plus a washer-dryer, and yes, one bedroom and a powder room.
