XXXXX DRUDGE REPORT XXXXX WED, JULY 28, 1999 21:49:08 ET XXXXX VOTE-BUYING ALLEGATIONS SWIRL AROUND IOWA STRAW POLL The new American campaign season is getting off to a old American start -- with scandal! The credibility of next month's Iowa straw poll of Republican presidential candidates was thrown into turmoil Wednesday night when the head of the state's Christian Coalition charged that the Steve Forbes campaign is buying votes. Iowa Christian Coalition chair Bobbie Lee Gobel alleged that a Forbes aide tried to hire 500 people from her temporary-worker company in an effort to win next month's straw poll, the BOSTON GLOBE reports in Thursday runs. Gobel said she is looking for "a Godly candidate." The Forbes campaign strongly denied the allegation, calling it "absurd." The allegation could not be independently verified. There is a $25 entrance fee per voter in the Aug. 14 straw poll. Gobel tells the GLOBE in a phone interview that a Forbes aide had inquired about hiring 500 "temps" from her firm [the owner of Metro Temp in Des Moines] -- "temps" who would be paid for four hours of work, during which they would vote for Forbes at the straw poll. Forbes' political director, Bill Dal Col, tells the GLOBE's Michael Kranish in Washington that the campaign never approached Gobel or a-n-y-o-n-e e-l-s-e about hiring temporary workers to vote for the publisher. "It never happened. She is embarrassing herself and her organization. We are building a grass-roots organization for a candidate who favors tax cuts and is pro-life. We are not paying anyone to go to a straw vote." Dal Col said the campaign is only paying for the $25 tickets and transportation expenses. [But they're all doing that.] X X X X X A draft of the plan the Clinton administration has developed for an extensive computer monitoring system, overseen by the FBI, that will track banking, telecommunications and other industries, has now been posted online at: http://www.cdt.org/policy/terrorism/fidnet X X X X X HELLO 2000: ABC'S PETER JENNINGS TO ANCHOR 22 HOURS ABC NEWS is planning 22 continuous hours of live millennial coverage on December 31, 1999 -- and anchor Peter Jennings will anchor all 22 of them! Networks insiders are already comparing the task to the grueling job Jerry Lewis takes up every year for his national telethon. "I take it as a personal challenge," Jennings told reporters gathered in Pasadena. With a satellite hookup from New York, Jennings told Pasadena that the longest he can remember being on-air was for 11 1/2 hours -- during coverage of the Challenger disaster. ABC is part of a 60-country consortium that will allow it to bring events from every continent on Earth. The ABC coverage begins at 6 a.m. Eastern time, Dec. 31, with Barbara Walters popping champagne on a ship cruising the waters of the international date line. The ATLANTA JOURNAL-CONSTITUTION's Drew Jubera reports that among locations to be visited during the 22-hour marathon: "New Zealand, where David Bowie performs at midnight; Egypt, where the pyramids will be draped in gold; an oil rig in Norway, where a concert is being held for the workers there; and a South African island where Nelson Mandela will welcome in 2000." ABC's Cokie Roberts may report from Rome, where her mother is ambassador to the Vatican. And Dick Clark will cover the ball drop in New York's Times Square. Clark will also go live to Las Vegas -- where a $70-million-enhanced fountain at the BELLAGIO HOTEL will be ground zero. ABC News President David Westin claims the network has "double and triple backup" for any Y2K problems that may hit during the coverage. And to those who would argue that the new millennium doesn't begin until Jan. 1, 2001, Media Lord Peter Jennings chuckled: "As this has been the century of the common man, I think we have all just increasingly begun to defer to the common man's instinct that the turnover date is 2000." X X X X X ALL-MALE, SUPER ELITE SUMMER CAMP COMING TO A CLOSE The all-male, super-elite, Pagan-chic and highly secretive BOHEMIAN CLUB comes to a close Saturday after having brought together top names in American business, entertainment and government circles. Over the years, the BOHEMIAN CLUB -- founded in 1872 by artists and journalists -- has been the subject of speculation and controversy. Reportedly members get together for all or some of the two week event to perform skits, sing songs, drink merrily, eat gourmet meals and listen to each other speak -- all while living in rustic cabins and showering together in a summer camp setting north of San Francisco. This year's campers included Henry Kissinger, Newt Gingrich, Colin Powell, U.N. arms inspector Richard Butler, Washington Post columnist David Broder, CHEERS star John Ratzenberger, race theorist and author Charles Murray and LETHAL WEAPON star Danny Glover. X X X X X NOW IT'S THE FRANKEN-FISH Secret experiments on genetically-modified salmon have taken place in Britain, the Government admitted Wednesday night. Scientists developed genetically modified salmon capable of growing at four times the rate of normal fish. Political parties and environmental campaigners have now demanded to know more about the project. More than 50 of the "franken-fish" were developed at Otter Ferry Salmon Ltd near Loch Fyne. The project started in secret four years ago when the growth hormone gene from the larger Canadian Chinook salmon was injected into 10,000 Atlantic salmon eggs. The fish were then kept in massive tanks on land for a year to avoid any risk of cross-fertilisation with wild salmon. It was then discovered around 50 fish had become genetically modified, growing at four times the normal rate. X X X X X NY TIMES SET FOR STARR BASHING SUNDAY Coming this Sunday, the NEW YORK TIMES is planning to devote a spread to STARR'S LAST TAPE, a one-man play in which a character named Starr, dressed in a prison jump suit and surrounded by tapes and tape recorders, sings hymns, tunes in to phone taps and dictates his memoirs. The play, developed around Independent Counsel Ken Starr, will have its premiere in Stockbridge, Mass., from Aug. 24 through 28. According to publishing sources, the TIMES is planning to run a splashy preview of the play -- which features Starr himself caught on tape interviewing a phone sex operator. Starr is also depicted in the act of personally wiring Linda Tripp for sound. One of the play's authors, Victor Navasky [NATION MAGAZINE], tells the paper that Richard Dreyfuss agreed to do a reading for STARR'S LAST TAPE. X X X X X WISDOM FROM MANDELSON? Britain's Peter Mandelson has been doing some serious thinking. Mandelson, media and political strategist behind the rise of British Prime Minister Tony Blair, may have been forced to resign from his government minister's job over a real estate scandal -- but he has kept busy dreaming of bright future days. In a speech to the European Media Forum earlier this week, Mandelson spoke of the deep changes taking place in the information industry. According to the BBC, he called for universal access to the Internet. "Just as public libraries gave everyone books in the 19th Century, so the Internet should be open to everyone in the next century." "Who needs boring, tame old newspapers when you can get the DRUDGE REPORT, and much else besides, online?" he asked. "I put this question to a national newspaper editor on Friday and his answer, perhaps a little too quick to be convincing, was 'trust'. "I think he is being a little optimistic. People will tend to trust technology more than journalists because of the suspicion that what appears in the press, especially about politics, is pre-cooked according to the paper's prejudices." X X X X X Are WASHINGTON POST editors just waiting for their readers to "cry uncle" before they stop? In fresh Thursday editions, the paper rolls out episode #5 in its continuous series on the life and times of George W. Bush. Thursday's 3,500-word episode [which brings the total word count over 18,000 so far] reveals, among other things, how Bush "never missed a chili supper" in late 1970s Midland, Texas. And he would wear cowboy boots too, ma. ----------------------------------------------------------- Filed by Matt Drudge Reports are moved when circumstances warrant http://www.drudgereport.com for breaks and updates (c)DRUDGE REPORT 1999 Not for reproduction without permission of the author
