This being chess, politics have played almost as big a part in the contest as the two Soviet grandmasters. The 24-year-old Mr Kasparov projects openness and even rebelliousness against authority. His supporters in the West say he is more in tune with Mr Gorbachev's new Russia than his brilliant but dour 36-year-old rival. At the end of the match, Mr Kasparov spoke to journalists about glasnost, perestroika and shaking up chess's ruling international body, FIDE; Mr Karpov did not give a press conference at all.

Dean was asked about the flag issue at a town hall meeting in Hampton, New Hampshire. Dean acknowledged that it was a mistake to use that particular phrasing.

"I should not have use the words 'Confederate flag.' That is a racist symbol. We understand that. We don't need to get into that.. it's a very sensitive symbol. The main message … which most people got … is about two things. First, we need to bring Southern whites into this party or we're not going to win elections anymore … . The second issue is about race in general."

The questioner referenced Kerry's Wednesday appearance on Manchester's WGIR, but Kerry insisted he had not said those words:

Questioner: "Senator, yesterday you said, ah, that you think your rival, Howard Dean, is unelectable; how come?" Kerry: "I don't think I said that … ". A moment later, the second questioner took a shot: Questioner: "Senator, you said that you didn't say that Howard Dean was unelectable … on a radio show what I have you saying was, 'Howard Dean will not be able to beat George Bush. I believe that very strongly. Sounds like a synonym (for unelectable) to me."

Kerry: "Well, it's a synonym. I'll accept that. But I didn't say he was unelectable. I said I don't think he'll be able to beat George Bush."

And, finally, the Senator voluntarily returned to the subject for clarification … sort of:
Kerry: "Can I just say in answer to the question earlier on the terminology, I wasn't trying to be cute, I just didn't use the word 'unelectable'. So, when you said that to me, I didn't realize, you know, that I do remember saying that, you know, I think it's hard to beat George Bush. That's all."

That's why it's so disappointing that Clark told a group of veterans yesterday that he supports a constitutional amendment to ban burning of the American flag. You could see President Bush trying to make this an issue in the campaign. (His father used it to impugn Michael Dukaksis's patriotism in 1988.) But Clark, of all the candidates, is perfectly insulated against attacks on his patriotism. Which means his support for the amendment must be genuine, not merely tactical. And that is genuinely scary. (TNR)

Late last month, six staff members of The Harvard Lampoon humor magazine loaded 2,000 copies of their latest spoof into a Range Rover and drove two hours north to Hanover, N.H.

Their destination: Dartmouth College, which was rocked a year and a half ago by charges of anti-Semitism after student staff members on the ultraconservative Dartmouth Review inserted a passage from Hitler's "Mein Kampf" in the Review's masthead.

Their mission: to distribute a look-alike takeoff of the Review titled "Spring Fashion Issue," featuring photos of Adolf Hitler posing in the woods in preppy garb and articles mimicking the conservative themes, the personal attacks and the inflammatory style for which the Review has become known.

Inside the parody issue, the Dartmouth president, James Freedman, is assailed as a "poo-poo head," the Democratic Party is characterized as the party of the elderly kept alive by "Medicaire," and fictitious editorial writers apologize for publishing passages of "Mein Kampf" but hail its "rhetorical flair unsurpassed in German literature since Nietzsche."

All in all it seemed like a chummy Ivy League prank -- until a Review reporter caught the Lampooners in a dorm, replacing real issues with the spoofs, and called the police. "They were nose to nose," said Bob McEwen, head of campus security.
...
Kenneth Weissman, the Review's editor in chief, then asked the Dartmouth administration to condemn the parody for its play on fascist themes, a request that was denied because Harvard, not Dartmouth students, were the instigators, said Alex Huppe, a Dartmouth spokesman. Mr. Huppe pointed out that the Review itself had once published a cartoon of President Freedman dressed like Hitler on its cover.
...
Mr. Weissman said he had called the police because the Lampoon staff members "were removing legitimate issues of the Review" from dormitories. In an open letter posted around the campus, he charged the Lampoon with "falsely representing" the Review.

Democrat senators’ holds and promised filibusters block another dozen or so nominees. This state of affairs is unprecedented: never before has the Senate denied a judicial nominee a simple up-or-down vote with a filibuster. (No, Abe Fortas’s 1968 nomination to Chief Justice of the Supreme Court doesn’t count; President Johnson, sensing that Fortas would lose an eventual vote to bipartisan opposition, withdrew Fortas’s nomination after four months and one lost cloture vote.)

It is important to double your efforts to get your boss to S-230 on time. Fox News channel is really excited about the marathon. Britt [sic] Hume at 6 would love to open the door to all our 51 Senators walking on to the floor. The producer wants to know, will we walk in exactly at 6:02 when the show starts so we can get it live to open Britt Hume's show? Or, if not, can we give them an exact time for the walk-in start?

--- Forwarded message from Graham Roth ---

>Date: 12 Nov 2003 16:51:33 EST
>From: Graham Roth
>Subject: this probably goes without saying


Hi, my friend Sue forwarded me a blitz to this list about the confederate flag posters going up around campus.

I only recognize a few names. If you don't know me, I'm the Editor of the Free Press and I spent the summer working on Howard Dean's campaign. I'm one of the co-chairs of Generation Dean at Dartmouth.

As you probably guessed, we did not put up those posters.

I'd appreciate it if you help out by taking down any that you come across.

Now the danger is that DNC Chief Terry McAuliffe is using and paying professional hit men to demean and denigrate political opponents. That's exactly what President Nixon did when he used the plumber's union to harass his opponents.