ShareThisBy M.E. SPRENGELMEYER
Scripps Howard News Service
Friday, August 03, 2007
Rep. Tom Tancredo and Sen. Barack Obama finally have something in common.
They're both being slammed this week in Pakistan.
For Tancredo, a Colorado Republican, it's a rerun.
In Iowa, he dusted off the controversy that sparked worldwide protests in 2005, when he told folks in Iowa that the United States should threaten to destroy Muslim holy sites as a deterrent to future attacks by Islamic terrorists.
And how did that go over in Islamabad? Not well, according to the Pakistan Tribune:
"Federal Minister for Parliamentary Affairs Sher Afghan Khan Niazi informed the House that the statement of U.S. Republican presidential hopeful is a serious matter. Tom Tancredo, he said, is mentally ill, adding that we have ability to protect the Holy Islamic sites. Unanimous resolution would be passed in the National Assembly soon, he told the House."
Obama, an Illinois Democrat, drew fire from Pakistan's government -- and street protests in places like Karachi -- after saying he might send U.S. troops into Pakistan if that's what it took to weed out terrorists.
And how did that play in Pakistan? Not well, according to various sources.
One blog went out of its way to chastise the "junior senator," quoting Pakistani Foreign Minister Khusheed Kasuri saying:
"It's a very irresponsible statement, that's all I can say. As the election campaign in America is heating up, we would not like American candidates to fight their elections and contest elections at our expense."
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This week, we featured the latest installment in a series: "The Back Roads Interview with Mitt Romney."
In it, the former Massachusetts governor -- who currently leads the Republican race in the first caucus state of Iowa -- defended President Bush's troop surge, talked about abortion, the Supreme Court, Colorado issues and others.
We asked if he was surprised that his Mormon faith has become such an issue.
Said Romney:
"Not really surprised. The campaigns, and of course the American citizens, are free to look at what they'd like to. I fundamentally believe, in the final analysis, people don't decide who to vote for based on where they go to church. That's what you see in countries in the Middle East, where we're trying very hard to encourage principles of plurality and tolerance. And I don't think you'll see that being a factor in the final analysis for who is our nominee."
But we saved the best question for last, just as his campaign SUV was pulling into downtown Des Moines:
SPRENGELMEYER: Last question. Do you always keep the air conditioning so high?
ROMNEY: No, we blow it on you so you freeze.
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A crowd of teachers in Storm Lake, Iowa, missed a chance for group sarcasm this week, when Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., asked them to raise their hands if they had ever been forced to buy school supplies out of their own pockets.
Wait a second. Wasn't it Clinton who had complained about show-of-hands inquiries during a recent debate?
Someone in the crowd should have said the same thing to Clinton that she told one of the debate moderators on CNN:
"Well, but, we're not going to engage in these hypotheticals ..."
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Sen. Sam Brownback of Kansas marked a time-honored Republican presidential candidate tradition on Tuesday when he invited reporters and photographers out to a firing range in Ames, Iowa, to prove that he knows how to handle a weapon.
The reporters and photographers got so close that after he fired at a distant target, the hot bullet casings flew out of the rifle and hit the journalists. Afterward, we offered him one as a souvenir, which he put into his pants pocket.
"It's to remind me to be nice to reporters," he said.
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Tancredo raised eyebrows with his unique incentive package to encourage folks to bring friends to this month's Ames Straw Poll in Iowa.
Bring 25 folks and, according to a campaign letter, you get an "autographed book, T-shirt and an all-expenses-paid trip to D.C. to meet Tom for dinner and get a tour of the U.S. Capitol!"
But wait. What about the congressional-ethics manual? It states that the "House buildings, and House rooms and offices -- including district offices -- are supported with official funds and hence are considered official resources. Accordingly, as a general rule, they may not be used for the conduct of campaign or political activities."
Not to worry, Tancredo's senior adviser, Bay Buchanan, says. It was a spelling error, and she meant the "capital," meaning the city of Washington, and nothing but the usual public tour of the "U.S. Capitol" building.
Glad we could help get that cleared up.
(E-mail M.E. Sprengelmeyer at sprengelmeyerm(at)shns.com. Bookmark the "Back roads to the White House" blog: http://blogs.rockymountainnews.com/denver/sprengelmeyer/)
