Inside the Beltway

Eddie rocks

NBC News anchor Brian Williams was invited back to the Catholic University of America in Washington, where he’d once bunked on the second floor of Alumni Hall, to deliver the 115th annual commencement address and reminisce about college life.

“It had the feel of a monastery,” he recalled of his dormitory — until such time “Eddie” cranked his record player.

“Down the hall, I heard the unmistakable sound of the B-52s — not the aircraft, mind you, the rock group. It was the song ‘Rock Lobster,’” Mr. Williams said. “I hunted down the stereo, and bounding from the room where the music was coming was a young man, ebullient, a great personality.

“He introduced himself as Eddie, a sophomore. You may know him today as Edward Gillespie, chairman of the Republican National Committee. There’s more where that came from if he ever tries anything on me.”

Mr. Williams then confessed to the class of 2004 that the honorary degree they’d just seen presented to him “is the only degree I have received from Catholic University. Ah, yes, I dropped out of college.”

This just in

Exactly 657 Democrats and independents leaning left were asked by Frank Luntz‘sresearch firm: “If you could vote for the candidate to run against George W. Bush in the fall and your only two choices were John Kerry and Hillary Rodham Clinton, for whom would you vote?”

Mrs. Clinton: 47 percent

Mr. Kerry: 44 percent

Kennedy connection

As the June 8 primary nears, former South Carolina Gov. David Beasley is leading five other candidates in the Republican contest for the seat of retiring Democratic Sen. Ernest F. Hollings.

That doesn’t sit well with some South Carolinians, who blame Mr. Beasley for removing the Confederate flag from the Statehouse dome in Columbia. After promising during his 1994 campaign to keep the flag on the dome, where it had waved since 1962, the Republican governor went on statewide television in November 1996 to propose moving the flag to the nearby Confederate Soldiers Monument. Mr. Beasley was defeated in his 1998 re-election bid, and the flag was moved in 2000 to the monument.

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