大象传媒

Double whammy

• Matt Davis
• 13 Oct 06, 10:34 AM

Both President Bush and his wife Laura turned up - separately - in St Louis, Missouri on Thursday - where an increasingly is raging between Republican Senator Jim Talent and his feisty Democratic challenger Claire McCaskill.

Mrs Bush was attending a private fundraiser for Mr Talent, a dyed-in-the-wool conservative who, records show, has voted with the president some 94% of the time.

It was the popular First Lady's third benefit gig for Mr Talent this year, a sign perhaps that the senator is feeling pressure from Ms McCaskill's campaign to woo some of the Republican-leaning social conservatives in rural parts of this Bible Belt state.

The president, meanwhile, was speaking at a renewable energy conference.

It wasn't a campaign speech, but the president name-checked Mr Talent, and his vision of corn and soy beans being used as the raw materials by future energy producers hit the spot with the Missouri farmers in the audience.

"We should put a couple windmills in Washington DC," quipped Mr Bush, to some laughter.

No word though from either of the Bushes on Mr Talent's recent comments in a TV debate with Ms McCaskill, which - with the president's ratings withering on the vine - were seen as an attempt by the senator to distance himself from the White House.

Asked - on NBC's Meet the Press - how he would rate the president, Mr Talent said: "History judges presidents. History is going to say there were some things he did that were right and some things he did that were wrong."

He added - much to Ms McCaskill's amusement: "Certainly he's going to end up better than Jimmy Carter, probably not as good as Ronald Reagan."

Matt Davis works on the world desk of the 大象传媒 News website.