(Posted by Donna Smith)

There’s a little bit of Dick Cheney in every potential vice presidential choice of Republican presidential candidate John McCain. At least that’s how the Democratic National Committee sees it. The DNC on Tuesday launched a new Internet site to drive home that point — www.TheNextCheney.com.

The Web site features an initial list of seven potential vice presidential choices for the presumptive Republican nominee and tries to tie them to President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney, who suffer from low approval ratings in public opinion polls.

“After lamenting the missed opportunity to make Dick Cheney his own vice president in 2001, McCain will have a chance very soon to choose his own Dick Cheney and we think its important that the American people have all the facts at their fingertips,” DNC spokesman Brad Woodhouse said in a conference call with reporters.

Woodhouse promises more information about the current Republican vice presidential possibilities and anyone else who might make it onto McCain’s list.

WASHINGTON - Democrats captured another Republican seat in the U.S. House of Representatives on Tuesday night during a special election in Mississippi, the third such victory this election cycle.

Yet another loss will likely strike fear in the hearts of many Republicans who are worried that it could have even bigger ramifications this November as they try to claw their way back to a majority.

In the race to represent northern Mississippi, Republican Greg Davis lost to Travis Childers despite a last-minute effort by Vice President Dick Cheney to woo voters at a campaign fundraiser for Davis on Monday. Childers will have to run again in November, this time for a full two-year term.

He will fill a seat vacated by Rep. Roger Wicker who was appointed to fill Sen. Trent Lott’s seat and expands the Democratic House majority to 236-199.

“His victory has sent a thunderbolt across America tonight,” said Rep. Chris Van Hollen, a Maryland Democrat who is chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.

Van Hollen also tried to broaden the meaning of the victory, arguing it was not only a setback for House Republicans but also “the Bush administration’s misguided policies and John McCain’s campaign for a third Bush term,” referring to the presumed Republican presidential nominee.

And a top House Republican appeared similarly grim in his assessment of the loss.

“The results … should serve as a wake-up call to Republican candidates nationwide,” said House Republican Leader John Boehner, an Ohio Republican. “As I’ve said before, this is a change election, and if we want Americans to vote for us we have to convince them that we can fix Washington.”

Earlier this year, Democrats won the Illinois seat held by the previous Republican House Speaker, Dennis Hastert, and captured the Louisiana seat held by departing Republican Richard Baker.

Are voters sending Republicans a message or are these isolated victories for Democrats?

Click here for more Reuters 2008 campaign coverage.

- Photo credit: Reuters/Jim Young (Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi takes the podium for the first time in January in her new position)

WASHINGTON - The Rev. Jeremiah Wright, Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama’s former pastor, pinned the blame on the media for the controversy over his fiery sermons, saying they misinterpreted his remarks and the ensuing criticism was an attack on the black church.
 
Obama has tried to distance himself from Wright, criticizing him for remarks that have included charges that the Sept. 11 attacks were an act of retaliation for U.S. policy and that the government may have created the AIDS virus to kill black people.
 
On Monday, Wright argued during a National Press Club speech that reporters did not listen to his entire sermons so they did not understand the context of his remarks and that people who question his patriotism are off the mark.
 
“I feel that those citizens who say that have never heard my sermons, nor do they know me.  They are unfair accusations taken from sound bites and that which is looped over and over again on certain channels,” he said. “I served six years in the military.  Does that make me patriotic?”

“How many years did Cheney serve?” he said, referring to Vice President Dick Cheney’s deferrals from the military draft. For his full remarks, click here. 
 
Does Wright’s remarks clear the air, does it help or hurt Obama, or has the issue run its course? 

Click here for more Reuters 2008 campaign coverage. 

- Photo credit: Reuters/Larry Downing (Wright speaks to the National Press Club).