Book sales based on Edwards' mistress continue to soar
(CNN) - Author Jay McInerney may have John Edwards to thank for a likely influx of book royalties.
His twenty-year old novel, based on the life of Edwards' mistress when she was a young adult, is soaring in sales rankings - so much so that the book's publisher has commissioned an additional 2,500 copies for print on Monday.
McInerney has said the book's main character, described as an "ostensibly jaded, cocaine-addled, sexually voracious 20-year old," was inspired by Rielle Hunter - the film producer who Edwards recently acknowledged having an affair with in 2006.
The book, about the New York singles scene amidst the excess of the 1980s, is now 299 on Amazon.com and 393 on Barnes&Noble.com - moves of a couple hundred places in only a handful of days. Before news of the affair broke, the book was thousands of spots lower.
Edwards, the former presidential candidate and 2004 vice presidential candidate, said he had a brief affair with Rielle Hunter in 2006 when she was employed by his political action committee to make "webisodes" about his campaign.
Despite breathing new life into one of his novels, McInerney said earlier this week he is no fan of the former North Carolina senator.
"To say that he slept with her but he wasn't in love with her - that's not very chivalrous," the author told the New York Daily News. "He's trying to distance himself from her."
"I don't feel my questions have been answered with regard to Edwards," he also said. "It was a half-assed confession."
Reporters get peek at Meghan McCain's children's book
DETROIT, Michigan (CNN) - Reporters on board John McCain’s campaign plane Wednesday got an early look at Meghan McCain’s soon-to-be-published “picture book biography” of her father, titled: “My Dad, John McCain.”
The Simon & Schuster hardback, set to hit stores on September 2, is a brief, sentimental look at the familiar elements of McCain’s legendary biography, including his time in a Vietnamese prison and his run for the White House in 2000.
Several pages are devoted to McCain’s military background and his imprisonment in Vietnam, with relatively little attention paid to his youth (he “broke a lot of rules” in high school, the book says) and to his time in Congress.
Cindy McCain, along with Meghan's siblings Jack, Jimmy and Bridget, are described fondly in the book - but the children from McCain’s first marriage are left unmentioned.
Illustrated by Dan Andreasen, the pictures in the book are gauzy sketches of famous McCain iconography: there’s a drawing of his cadet head shot from the Naval Academy, as well as a rendition of a still-recuperating McCain’s meeting with Richard Nixon following his return from Vietnam. McCain is also depicted sitting forlornly in his Hanoi prison cell.
Obama up in Pennsylvania, New Jersey
(CNN) - New polls out Wednesday show Barack Obama is leading in two Northeastern states - one of which will likely play a key role in deciding the next President of the United States.
A Franklin & Marshall poll out of Pennsylvania shows the Illinois senator leads McCain by eight points (44-36 percent) among registered voters, while a Quinnipiac poll of likely voters in New Jersey puts Obama up by 10 there. The Pennsylvania poll has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.9 percentage points, while the New Jersey poll's margin or error is plus or minus 2.6 points.
Pennsylvania is a perennial battleground state and will be heavily contested by both candidates this fall. In 2004, John Kerry carried it by less than 200,000 votes. New Jersey may be a safer bet for Obama - the state hasn't voted for a Republican presidential candidate since 1988.
Obama ad: McCain's Iraq policies harm the U.S. economy
(CNN) - Barack Obama’s campaign is releasing a new ad pointing to John McCain’s support for the Iraq war as one reason for the faltering state of the U.S. economy.
“Economics … by John McCain,” says the announcer in the 30-second spot. “Support George Bush 95 percent of the time. Keep spending ten billion dollars a month for the war in Iraq while the Iraqis sell oil for record prices - giving Iraq a $79 billion oil surplus, and hurting our economy.
“Barack Obama’s plan: End the war responsibly. Better schools. No more tax breaks for oil companies. Barack Obama … the Middle Class first.”
The campaign said the ad is slated to hit the airwaves Thursday in 16 battleground states, including Alaska, Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Michigan, Missouri, Montana, New Mexico, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia and Wisconsin.
UPDATE: “In the Senate, Barack Obama has voted in lockstep with President George W. Bush nearly half the time, including the Bush-Cheney Energy bill which gave close to 3 billion dollars in new giveaways to Big Oil – a terrible policy that John McCain opposed," said McCain spokesman Tucker Bounds. "The truth is Barack Obama’s plan is a job killing machine that ignores the struggling economy and raises taxes on family savings, social security and small businesses.”
Huckabee, religious-based groups making the 'Call' to DC
While John McCain and Barack Obama appear together Saturday at a minister-moderated forum held in a church, thousands of evangelicals are expected to gather in the nation’s capital to pressure both men move further to the right on the social issues.
TheCall - a group representing so-called “values voters” – will hold a rally on the National Mall as both candidates speak at Pastor Rick Warren’s 20,000-member Saddleback mega church in southern California, where the author of the best-selling book, “The Purpose Driven Life,” is slated to interview both McCain and Obama.
TheCall, and Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council - a Christian organization that opposes same-sex marriage and abortion rights - will hold a press conference in Washington Friday to push McCain and Obama to delve further into issues facing evangelical voters, The Hill newspaper reported Saturday.
Former GOP presidential candidate and Baptist minister Mike Huckabee will also attend the press conference, according to the paper.
Lou Engle, Founder of the Justice House of Prayer, says “it's time for TheCall to expand to the national stage in an historic gathering in our nation's capital this Saturday,” according to the group’s Web site.
He says it isn't a conference or a festival, but rather a “a solemn assembly - a gathering of all ages, races and denominations. The 12 hours of TheCall are spent primarily before the Lord in prayer and worship.”
While McCain is generally considered a moderate, evangelicals leaders say they do not believe he has adopted consistently conservative positions on some social issues. The Republican is against abortion rights and opposes same-sex marriage, but is a supporter of embryonic stem cell research – a position that many religious groups oppose.
Obama’s position in favor of abortion rights and same-sex civil unions have also created some tension among evangelical voters otherwise drawn to his candidacy this cycle.
Mark Warner to deliver Democratic convention keynote
WASHINGTON (CNN) - Former Virginia Governor and Senate candidate Mark Warner will deliver the keynote address at this month’s 2008 Democratic National Convention.
Barack Obama’s presidential campaign announced Wednesday that Warner will deliver the speech on the convention’s second night, Tuesday August 26 - that’s also the night that Senator Hillary Clinton (D-New York) will also speak in prime time. Clinton came very close to winning the Democratic presidential nomination, dropping her bid for the White House and backing Obama just two months ago, after the end of the primary season.
But Warner gets the coveted role of keynote speaker. Four years ago a little-known state lawmaker from Illinois who was running for the Senate had the same role. His speech at the convention in Boston was highly praised by Democrats. That man, Obama, went on to win his election and now the Democrat’s presumptive presidential nominee.
Warner won election as Virginia’s governor in 2001, the first in a string of statewide election victories by Democrats this decade in a state that was once dominated by Republicans. Warner is now facing off with the man he succeeded in Richmond, Republican Jim Gilmore, in the battle to succeed retiring Senator John Warner (no relation to Mark Warner), a Republican who has held the seat for three decades.
Democrats say the theme of the second night of the convention will be “Renewing America’s Promise.”
Clooney denies e-mail relationship with Obama
(CNN)—George Clooney and Scarlett Johansson have more in common than their A-list star status: both have had to shoot down reports they’re close e-mail buddies of presumptive Democratic nominee Barack Obama.
Clooney is flatly denying a report in the Los Angeles Times that he “frequently text messages the Illinois senator with whom he's been friends for many years.”
"I have never texted or e-mailed Senator Obama. And I'll offer a million dollars to anyone who could prove otherwise,” Clooney said in a statement. “I've spent more time with Senator McCain (he did my TV show) then I have with Senator Obama. I would hope that my friend John McCain would join me in condemning this kind of politics.”
Clooney told CNN in February he had no plans to hit the campaign trail for the presumptive Democratic nominee despite his endorsement because of the adverse affects celebrity endorsements can have on a candidate.
“I feel that at times you can harm the person that you are trying to help,” Clooney told said in February.
Watch: Clooney won't hit the trail for Obama
As for offering policy advice? Clooney said both candidates are doing well without his input.
Georgian president to McCain: Move 'from words to deeds'
Watch the entire interview with President Saakashvili.
(CNN) – Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili on Wednesday called for John McCain and other American leaders to do more for Georgia in their response to the conflict in his country.
“Yesterday, I heard Sen. McCain say, ‘We are all Georgians now,’” Saakashvili said on CNN’s American Morning. “Well, very nice, you know, very cheering for us to hear that, but OK, it’s time to pass from this. From words to deeds.”
McCain told a crowd in Pennsylvania yesterday that he had called Saakashvili to express solidarity with the people of Georgia, saying: “Today, we are all Georgians.”
McCain’s foreign policy adviser Randy Scheunemann told reporters on the campaign plane Tuesday that McCain’s remark “obviously meant a lot to Saakashvili personally, but more importantly the message it conveyed to the Georgian people in this really, time of unprecedented national emergency.” Scheunemann said McCain and Saakashvili are friends who have speaking daily throughout the crisis.
McCain adviser criticizes Obama's lack of experience with Georgia
NEWARK, New Jersey (CNN) - John McCain's top foreign policy adviser briefed reporters Tuesday on his candidate's policy towards Russia and Georgia, noting that McCain and Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili are friends that have been speaking throughout the conflict "to exchange daily updates about what's going on."
The adviser, Randy Scheunemann, also confirmed a report that McCain and Saakashvili enjoyed a day of water sports in the summer of 2006.
"I can confirm that Sen. McCain and President Saakashvili were jet-skiing on the Black Sea together," he said.
Reporters spent several minutes asking Scheunemann, a former lobbyist for the government of Georgia, to firm up details on McCain's comments regarding the crisis that has unfolded in recent days.
Asked about Barack Obama's statements on the Georgia situation, Scheunemann accused the Democrat of lacking experience on the matter, saying his record consists only of a handful of paper statements, most of which related to matters of loose nuclear material. But McCain's record on Georgia and Russia, he argued, runs deep.
"There's a depth of knowledge, a breadth of knowledge, and an extent of historical experience that doesn't compare between the two on Russia policy," Scheunemann said. "You can't compare a 15-year historical record to three or four statements over the course of 15 months."
Former McCain ally touted for Obama's VP
(CNN) - Former Republican Rep. Jim Leach endorsed Barack Obama's White House bid Tuesday, and said he hopes the Illinois senator considers a former GOP ally of rival John McCain as his running mate.
Speaking on a conference call with reporters to announce a new effort among Republicans in support of Obama's candidacy, Leach said he thought Nebraska Sen. Chuck Hagel should join the Democratic ticket.
"There are a number of impressive potential vice presidential candidates and this is a singular decision for one person, and that is Barack Obama," Leach said. "But personally I'd be hopeful in the list of serious candidates to be considered would be Chuck Hagel, whether it be for the veep position or a serious position in an Obama administration."
Listen: Republicans announce support of Obama
Hagel, who has butted heads with his party over the war in Iraq and is not seeking a third Senate term, has said he would consider a VP offer from Obama. But it remains unclear just how much of a consideration Hagel is.
iReport.com: Share your picks for VP
While the Vietnam War veteran would instantly add gravitas and bipartisanship to the ticket, his longstanding opposition to abortion rights and gay marriage would not sit well with the Democratic base.
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