Gore faces attack on water, in air
It had been a bad enough day for Al Gore 's campaign, what with fending off all those questions about the Connecticut River getting pumped up with extra water to keep the vice president's canoe afloat for a photo opportunity. But then, Gore's people arrived for a cookout at Hampton Beach only to find Bill Bradley supporters (with big signs) at the entrance - and later an airplane buzzing above the Gore crowd, trailing a ''Bill Bradley for President'' banner.
The Gore campaign was not happy. Gore's state director, Nick Baldick , called Bradley's campaign office in Concord, and, according to the Bradley people who described him as ''angry,'' asked for his counterpart on the Bradley side, Mark Longabaugh, who wasn't around. Baldick said later he didn't call to complain but was just ''curious'' to know if Longabaugh had given the OK for Bradley people to show up at a Gore event. Apparently some people think that is a no-no in the book of campaign etiquette. We didn't know there was such a thing.
Longabaugh says the people at the beach entrance were just ''exuberant'' college kids and interns for Bradley with a four-piece sign that read ''Been There. Done That. Bill Bradley Beach Walk. June 30, 1999.'' Those same rascally kids, Longabaugh suggested, were behind the airplane. He insists the Bradley campaign had nothing to do with any of it.
At least one Gore campaign aide took the lighter approach to the Bradley presence. ''Bradley's head is up in the clouds,'' Gore's press spokesman, Chris Lehane, said as he watched the Bradley plane tooling around above the cookout crowd. ''The votes are all here on the ground.''
Barefoot reporter gets the lowdown
From the don't talk to strangers on the campaign trail department: Vermont's secretary of natural resources, John Kassel, says he had no idea that the barefoot guy with the rolled-up pants who chatted with him after Gore's canoe trip was a reporter for The Washington Times. Then what Kassel says he assumed was casual chit-chat along the river erupted into headlines. The Times reporter quoted Kassel saying officials wouldn't release extra water into the Connecticut River for fish, but would do it for a politician - namely Gore, so that his canoe wouldn't get stuck in the muck while cameras were gawking at him.
Kassel, who admits he can be sort of a wise guy, says he may have said something like that but doesn't think he was that ''flippant.'' The reporter didn't have a notebook in his hand and identified himself after the conversation, Kassel said, although he admits that everybody was well aware that the event was swarming with media types. We are told the Times reporter was wearing the usual collection of press badges around his neck and had a notebook hanging out of his back pocket.
''I'm a big fan of Al Gore and wasn't trying to trash him in any way,'' Kassel said. After the story appeared, Kassel said, his phone rang all day, including a call from a producer for Ollie North, who wanted Kassel to appear on his talk show. Kassel declined.
Trip causes ripples in political stream
So what did happen with that canoe? The Times stands by its story, including its report, based on information from an official at the Wilder Dam, that 4 billion gallons of water was released (officials now say it was only 97 million). The political faux pas came when the Connecticut River Joint Commission, which was hosting Gore's visit, asked that the water be released two hours early - to make sure Gore, in a canoe with Governor Jeanne Shaheen, would float. The Gore campaign - which had told the commission to follow normal procedures - paid the price with a landslide of press scrutiny and charges of favoritism.
State GOP chairman Steve Duprey, unable to resist his own chance for a photo opportunity, called a press conference on the banks of the Merrimack River, and said this brouhaha will send Gore and Shaheen ''down the river in the next election.''
In a dueling press conference at the same spot, House minority leader and Gore supporter Peter Burling said he would put everything Duprey said in the manure spreader he uses on his fields in Cornish.
Enough already.
Vice president gains more supporters
Good news for Gore: At Hampton Beach, state Senator Beverly Hollingworth of Hampton announced that she had signed on with the Gore team. And Hampton Selectman Brian Warburton said he was switching from the GOP to the Democratic Party, and was also endorsing Gore. Warburton says the Republican Party is going the wrong way on the environment and education. Said Gore: ''I think you've got a bright future, Brian.''
Bradley backers start campaign push
Meanwhile, about 500 Bradley volunteers, from 14 states, fanned out around New Hampshire last week, hoping to touch base with 100,000 voters. The former New Jersey senator was expected to be in Manchester yesterday for a rally to wrap up the event. Among the volunteers canvassing about 22 cities were Richard Cody, the minority leader of the New Jersey Senate, John Waks, the mayor of Wayne, N.J., and a guy named Bill Bradley, from Berlin, N.H.
GOP leaders say forget straw poll
On June 2, on official GOP stationery, party chairman Steve Duprey excitedly announced the Republicans would host their first straw poll in October at the party's ''Family Day'' at the Hopkinton Fairgrounds. Tickets to this ''terrific event'' would be $50 a head - a tantalizing fund-raiser for the GOP. Duprey, the first to admit to greed when it comes to stuffing the GOP coffers, saw visions of raking in close to $300,000.
Now, six weeks after that letter went out, the straw poll has been deep-sixed. Duprey, who first agreed to lower the ticket price to $25, says discretion eventually overcame his desire for ''a big war chest'' that he could use, for example, to finance GOP candidates for state Senate seats. The GOP executive committee was cool to the straw poll idea - they didn't think it was the New Hampshire way - and sentiment in years past has been that such things would detract from New Hampshire's first-in-the-nation presidential primary.
Duprey says he also became concerned about the possibility that - months before anybody casts a primary vote - a straw poll could deliver a ''knock-out punch'' to candidates who don't perform well in it.
By the way, the state party says cancellation of the poll had nothing to do with the fact that on July 9 Texas Governor George W. Bush said he wasn't coming.
Buses wanted for Iowa voters
In fact, many political observers are worried that the Aug. 14 Iowa straw poll may be a matter of political life and death for some candidates in the bottom tier of GOP presidential hopefuls.
Here's a measure of the frenzy out there. The Des Moines Register reports that the campaigns have already rented virtually every air-conditioned bus in the state to ferry their supporters to the straw poll in Ames, which may attract as many as 12,000 people.
With no buses left in Iowa, the search has gone out of state, as far away as Chicago, the Register said.
''It's slim pickings out there,'' said a charter bus company owner who has secured 40 buses for George W. Bush and is looking for more. ''It's like looking for corn in a field after the picker has gone through,'' he told the Register.
Get the results, and a hot dog, too
If you're in New Hampshire and need a straw poll fix on Aug. 14, head to Hooksett American Legion Post 37 where the GOP is hosting a cookout. You can have hamburgers and hot dogs and watch the results on a big-screen TV - for a mere $2 a head.
Republicans move to new party posts
Alittle more from the GOP side: The new assistant chairman of the state party is Barbara Yates of Durham. She's taking over for Barbara Russell of Dover, who went off to work for the Bush campaign. And there's a connection. Russell ran Yates's 1994 campaign to try to unseat the incumbent, then senator Jeanne Shaheen of Madbury. Yates, a former Durham town councilor, got 46 percent of the vote.
And Jayne Marcucci, who had been working in US Senator Bob Smith's office until he went independent, is now the party's executive director.
Jill Zuckman of the Globe Staff contributed to this report.
Got a tip or a comment from the campaign trail, state government or town hall? The Political Diary wants to hear from you at: Political Diary, Boston Globe/New Hampshire Weekly, 1650 Elm St., Manchester, NH 03301, or by e-mail at kiernan@globe.com. Please include home and work telephone numbers.
