Candidates in New Hampshire

A steady stream of Democratic and Republican presidential hopefuls have been heading to New Hampshire to do politicking at the retail level for 2008; the newspapers there have a ringside seat to what is happening as we hear from Sarah Liebowitz of the Concord Monitor:

Since his 2004 primary loss, Edwards "has vastly strengthened his ties to organized labor," joining picket lines in Connecticut and embarking on a four-city tour in support of hotel workers, Christensen said. After facing criticism that he was a foreign policy lightweight, Edwards has worked to beef up his credentials, traveling to Europe, Asia and the Middle East.

The majority of possible Democratic candidates fall into another category: The almost-definites.

New York Sen. Hillary Clinton advanced her campaign in recent weeks, hiring several high-profile strategists and contacting prominent Democrats in New Hampshire and Iowa. ...

(snip)

Arizona Sen. John McCain, who lost the Republican nomination to Bush in 2000, is preparing another campaign for president.

Last month, McCain created an exploratory committee, the formal step most candidates take before officially announcing. McCain has said that he will make a final decision over the holidays, but he has already snagged several prominent Republican strategists for his campaign. He has also bolstered his support among lawmakers across the nation: He conducted 346 events for other candidates in the run-up to the midterm elections, helping raise millions of dollars.

(snip)

Then there's Newt Gingrich, former House speaker and architect of the "Contract with America," which helped usher Republicans to congressional victories in 1994. Although Gingrich has visited New Hampshire and left the door open to a possible presidential run, he has said that he won't make an announcement until September.

I'm amazed that Edwards was regarded in 2004 as a foreign policy lightweight given George W. Bush's indifference to the subject when he became president; even today, there isn't much evidence that most Republican hopefuls understand why Bush's policies have been such a failure.

Actually I'm a little sorry former House Speaker Newt Gingrich hasn't jumped in, though he has mentioned, not all that modestly, that he's open to being drafted by the voters. He's about the only candidate who's virtually advocating World War Three; he could actually be very helpful in explaining to Americans how far to the right the Republican Party has drifted these days. Since many Republican events in this era are not open to the public, one has to wonder if some of the other Republican hopefuls are talking the same nonsense as Gingrich. Certainly Gingrich has been taking his cues from a number of neoconservative intellectuals who haven't learned much from the last four years.

Almost all the candidates are mentioned in the article but I noticed four absences: Dennis Kucinich, Mike Gravel and Joe Biden on the Democratic side and, although he may not run, Chuck Hagel on the Republican side.