CHICAGO - The Chicago hotel where journalists coined the phrase “smoke-filled room” to denote a backroom deal by political heavyweights reopened for business on Wednesday after a refurbishment.

It was from a suite of rooms on the fourth floor of the Blackstone Hotel that Republican party leaders emerged in June 1920 to declare Ohio Sen. Warren Harding the surprise nominee. The Republican party convention convention deadlocked over two other candidates.

Legend has it that a cloud of cigar smoke poured from the room as they came out to make the announcement to assembled journalists, who coined the phrase that entered the American political lexicon. It refers to a behind-the-scenes move by party bosses to pick candidates.

Some historians credit Harding’s friend Harry Daugherty with creating the phrase ahead of the convention.   Harding was subsequently elected the 29th U.S. president.

The original smoke-filled room was redone as part of a $100 million refurbishment of the once-decrepit Georgian Michigan Avenue landmark. Smoking is no longer permitted in the room.

The phrase has made something of a comeback this political season, with Democrats closely divided between two presidential hopefuls that could end up leaving it to nearly 800 party elites called superdelegates to choose the party’s nominee. 

Presumably, conventioneers in Denver can find a place where smoking is allowed.

Click here for more Reuters 2008 campaign coverage.

CHICAGO - Comedian, author and former radio talk show host Al Franken, the likely Democratic Senate candidate for Minnesota, is paying $70,000 in back taxes and penalties to 17 states to make up for what he says were mistakes by his accountant.

State Republicans say Franken, who was expected to pose a strong challenge to incumbent Republican Sen. Norm Coleman in the November election, is at fault. 

“Al Franken’s business activities must have a full, and complete public airing if he is to retain any credibility as a candidate for public office,” Ron Carey, chairman of the Republican Party of Minnesota, said in a statement.

Franken told the Minneapolis Star Tribune that errors by his New York accountant led him to overpay $49,253 taxes to New York state and Minnesota where he lived between 2003 and 2006, while not paying $53,404 in taxes to 17 states where he earned money for appearances and speeches.

The $70,000 is an estimation of what he owes, Franken said.

He and his wife, Franni, “believe in paying state and federal taxes on all our income,” Franken told the newspaper.

Carey said in a statement that Franken signed a disclosure statement showing he was aware of earning money in California and elsewhere.

Click here for more Reuters 2008 campaign coverage.

Photo credit: Reuters/Eric Miller (Al Franken speaks at rally in March)

DETROIT - No presidential candidate could resist touring the Detroit Auto Show on the eve of Michigan’s Republican presidential primary on Tuesday, and there were at least two near-crashes between their entourages.

While former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney answered reporters’ questions in front of Chevrolet’s (GM) concept hydrogen fuel cell car, rival Mike Huckabee, the former Arkansas governor, got briefed a few feet away on the merits of a Chevrolet hybrid SUV.

A Romney aide pleaded with Huckabee’s camp for some space, but apparently didn’t get much cooperation. Still, many in Romney’s bulging press corps failed to notice the intrusion.

Meanwhile, Sen. Joe Lieberman, the Connecticut independent backing his Senate colleague from Arizona, John McCain, passed a few feet away as Romney inspected Ford Motor Co.’s latest models.

McCain was due to arrive a little later on Monday at the auto show, a premier event for the industry that was born in Michigan.

Romney, surrounded by cameras and gawking car company executives, also peeked into new models from Chrysler LLC, General Motors, and Ford — while avoiding any foreign-owned carmakers.

Romney, who grew up in Michigan, peeked into Chrysler’s Jeep line of new concept cars that are not yet in mass production. Jeeps were once made by American Motors, a company which his father, former Michigan Gov. George Romney, ran before entering politics. The company was later absorbed by Chrysler.

Romney repeated his call for the federal government to “throw life savers, not anvils” at Detroit’s domestic automakers so they can compete on a level playing field.

Asked what cars he owns, Romney hedged initially, then said he had a Ford Mustang, a Cadillac model from GM, a Chevrolet Silverado, and a 1962 American Motors Rambler given to him by his children. He also said he hoped to win the primary, and pledged to fight on, whether he crashes and burns in Michigan or not.

Click here for more Reuters 2008 campaign coverage. 

- Photo credit: Reuters/John Gress (Romney meets with Chrysler CEO Bob Nardelli)

Democratic presidential hopefuls Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama are running neck-and-neck in Iowa based on unofficial sales of campaign buttons, T-shirts and other paraphernalia. So says one entrepreneur cashing in on the spending juggernaut that is the Iowa caucuses.
 
Royce Vaughn and his Oakland, California-based outfit, Shop Political, don’t have ties to any particularly candidate but are welcomed — or at least tolerated — by the candidates outside campaign stops across the country.
 
On Tuesday, Vaughn and his team of salesmen shivered in the afternoon chill outside a barn in Amana, Iowa, hawking buttons for Clinton. The next day, they hawked merchandise outside an Obama event in Bettendorf.
 
“Button vending goes back to Abraham Lincoln’s time, when they were made out of paper. We use only high-quality materials, union-made,” Vaughn said. 
 
For $5 each or three for $10, supporters could express their hopes for an Obama victory. One quotes a Franklin Roosevelt’s slogan, “Happy Days Are … .” Another pink-colored button has a woman’s face and Obama’s and reads “Hot Chicks Dig Obama,” (appearing to reference a widely seen video featuring a voluptuous songstress singing Obama’s praises).
 
Vaughn and his band pitch paraphernalia for just about any candidate — but only for the candidate making that day’s appearance.  “We can’t afford to offend anyone,”

He donates some of the profits to the two parties’ national committees. But Vaughn definitely knows his politics and offered comments about several candidates, but wouldn’t declare his own allegiance.
 
“Based on sales, I’d say Hillary and Obama are very close in Iowa,” he said. “On the Republican side, its (Mitt) Romney and (Rudy) Giuliani.”
 
Planned for the company’s Web site, http://www.shoppolitical.com/ (which was not up as of this writing) Vaughn said a pseudo-poll will indicate each party’s respective campaign paraphernalia sales, but doesn’t expect it will impress mainstream pollsters. 
 
Can buttons, bumper stickers, T-shirts and yard signs sway an election? They certainly can’t hurt, and might indicate momentum, Vaughn said.