Feel the heat

From the Boston Globe: “Kerry camp on the defensive after celebrities bash Bush”

John F. Kerry and John Edwards boasted yesterday about the positive tone of their presidential campaign hours after celebrities at one of their fund-raisers unleashed a stream of invective against President Bush that sparked outrage from Republicans and calls by Bush supporters for Kerry to make public a tape of the event.

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Monitors showed Kerry, the presumed Democratic presidential nominee, laughing through much of the concert. Afterward, he told the audience that the performers "conveyed the heart and soul of our country." His only quibble was with Goldberg's repeated references to Edwards as "Kid." Kerry said his 51-year-old running mate, who is nine years his junior, is "a man."

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The Radio City event prompted a sharp rebuke from the Bush-Cheney reelection committee, which noted that Kerry attended the concert despite saying earlier on CNN's "Larry King Live" that he had not had enough time to get an intelligence briefing. The administration warned Thursday of Al Qaeda plans to attack the United States and offered to brief Kerry. Kerry's campaign said he has scheduled the briefing for Sunday.

"It is a great example of John Kerry's priorities that on the day he said he did not have time to receive his intelligence briefing on threats to America, he found time to attend a Hollywood fund-raiser, filled with enough hate and vitriol to make Michael Moore blush," Bush-Cheney campaign spokesman Steve Schmidt said.

All of that terrorism stuff is secondary to Job One.