ARLSBAD, Calif. - The annual meeting of the nation's Republican governors turned into a lovefest yesterday for one who stayed away: George W. Bush of Texas. In their policy discussions, meetings with reporters and in a formal endorsement expected at the close of business today, the governors said Bush is among their best and brightest and should take his chief executive's experience to the White House. Bush did not attend the two-day meeting at the LaCosta Resort and Spa just north of San Diego. Instead, he campaigned in Iowa. (AP)
McCain, Forbes rail against budget deal
NASHVILLE - Bucking his party's leadership, Republican presidential candidate John McCain said yesterday that he will vote against the bipartisan budget deal. The Arizona senator called it ''a scathing, unconscionable depiction of the way we do business in Washington.'' Republican rival Steve Forbes joined McCain in decrying the lack of tax and spending cuts in the proposed budget, while front-runner George W. Bush gave only a lukewarm endorsement for a pact that could set the tone for the 2000 elections. Vice President Al Gore backed President Clinton in support of the $390 billion budget bill. His sole rival for the Democratic presidential nomination, Bill Bradley, did not take a stand on the deal. (AP)
Giuliani TV ads aim to get upstate votes
ALBANY - In an unusual move for a Senate election almost a year away, Republican New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani unveiled television advertisements yesterday tailored to individual markets in upstate New York. The new ads, which were to begin airing yesterday in Buffalo, Rochester, and Syracuse, stress local landmarks. Giuliani media consultant Adam Goodman said the new ads seek ''to give people a sense of identification and a sense of local pride.'' A spokesman for Hillary Rodham Clinton, the mayor's expected Democratic opponent, called the new ads ''an admission that Rudy Giuliani's first ads backfired because they showed no sensitivity to the needs and concerns of upstate voters.'' (AP)
Forbes criticizes capital lobbyists
WOLFEBORO, N.H. - Republican Steve Forbes described Washington yesterday as a swamp of special interests, and said that as president, he would drain it. ''Washington attracts special interests the way a swamp attracts mosquitoes,'' Forbes told about 200 people at a campaign breakfast. ''We've got to start draining this particular swamp. It's beyond saving.'' He said the income tax code, which he wants dumped in favor of a 17 percent flat tax, accounts for about half the lobbying in the capital. (AP)
Time Warner vows: no more soft money
WASHINGTON - A month after Senate Republicans killed efforts to ban soft money, Time Warner executives announced that the company will stop making the unregulated donations from its corporate treasury to the political parties. The move makes Time Warner - the parent of Cable News Network, Time magazine and Warner Brothers - the fifth company to stop making donations of soft money, so named because they are not subject to federal contribution limits. (AP)
