Inside the Beltway

Honor Bill

“Services are scheduled for 7:00 p.m. … at Palms Funeral Home in Angleton, Texas. In lieu of flowers, Bill would be most honored and gratified by you voting for the Bush/Cheney ticket in November.”

— Newspaper obituary for William Kappes Thomasset, a West Point graduate and concerned grandfather of 10, who died at age 81.

Poor goose

On the heels of a camouflaged Sen. John Kerry bagging an Ohio goose with a 12-gauge shotgun, Interior Secretary Gale A. Norton yesterday traveled to the same battleground state to present awards to conservation organizations that promote wildlife conservation and habitat enhancement.

Campaign cha-cha

It gets extremely monotonous covering a presidential campaign, as reflected in this official White House pool report, filed yesterday after a visit to Greely, Colo., by President Bush, first lady Laura Bush and former New York Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani and his wife, Judith:

“With a couple of dozen airmen and civilians looking on, [the two couples] did the arrival dance: Salute, wave, walk, cha, cha, cha. Pause, wave, climb steps, cha, cha, cha. Big Finish here! Turn, pause, wave, cha, cha, cha. (Caution: Music may have been playing only in pooler’s head.)”

Upset Bowles

We did a double-take after reading this latest headline from the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee: “Bowels up 46-44 in Latest DSCC Poll.”

Change that from Bowels to Erskine Bowles, former White House chief of staff to President Clinton, who is running neck and neck against Republican Rep. Richard M. Burr in the North Carolina Senate race.

Condi baby

“On the right we have beauty and brains,” Lisa De Pasquale, program director of the Clare Boothe Luce Policy Institute, tells Inside the Beltway.

She calls our undivided attention to the 2005 Great American Conservative Women calendar, to be released on Nov. 1 by the group whose mission is to prepare women for conservative leadership and promote school-choice opportunites.

“Each month features a couple of pictures and thought-provoking quotes,” she says of “calendar girls” who include:

Miss February: Star Parker, founder of the Coalition on Urban Renewal & Education

Miss May: Laura Schlessinger, radio talk-show host

Miss July: Ann Coulter, conservative author

Miss August: Michelle Malkin, syndicated conservative columnist

Miss October: Monica Crowley, Fox News political and international affairs analyst

Miss September: Condoleezza Rice, national security adviser to President Bush

Miss December: Shemane Nugent, wife of outdoorsman/gun-rights advocate/rocker Ted Nugent and founder of the “Queen of the Forest Outdoor Education” program

One last point

The final presidential debate of sorts will be held tomorrow evening at 8 o’clock, pitting John O’Neill, author of the best-selling book “Unfit for Command” (and now with the famous — or infamous, depending on the reader — Swift Boat Veterans and POW’s for Truth), against John Greely of Vietnam Veterans for John Kerry.

The two will debate the Democratic nominee’s military record and subsequent antiwar activism as guests of the Schiffer Report (aired locally on 1220 AM radio), the same program that broke the swift boat story in April on the heels of C-SPAN’s rebroadcast of Mr. Kerry’s debate with Mr. O’Neill on the Dick Cavett Show in 1971.

Bush landslide

Hang on, poll-weary Americans, Election Day is almost upon us.

The latest presidential polling numbers sent to Inside the Beltway range from a virtual dead heat to the most lopsided results we could find: an IncrediMail poll that gives George W. Bush 74.4 percent to John Kerry’s 25.6 percent (no margin of error listed).

Seinfeld sanctuary

Funny bones of future visitors to the Smithsonian Institution will be tickled once artifacts from the popular TV show “Seinfeld” go on display at the National Museum of American History.

A donation reception is scheduled for Nov. 18, featuring an appearance by Jerry Seinfeld, museum director Brent D. Glass, Sony Pictures Television President Steve Mosko, and Columbia TriStar Home Entertainment President Benjamin S. Feingold.

Among the museum-bound relics: the puffy shirt from “The Puffy Shirt” episode, in which Jerry Seinfeld complains: “But I don’t want to be a pirate.”

• John McCaslin, whose column is nationally syndicated, can be reached at 202/636-3284 or jmccaslin@washingtontimes.com.