by Mark Silva

KENNEBUNKPORT, Me. -- First Lady Laura Bush, who has returned from a weeklong tour of Africa, told the Tribune on the flight home that she and the president have "no regrets'' about the way events have turned out during his administration.

They never stop to think what his presidency would be like if the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, hadn't happened, she said aboard the jet, Bright Star, carrying her home.

"Neither George or I are the kind to look back and think, 'Oh, what if? Why did this happen when I was president?' " the first lady said. "I think it's because he is a realist. … And it's just that this is what's happened, this is the hand we were dealt, and you just have to move on and do the very best you can with that hand."

For more on the hand they were dealt, and the very different hand they had hoped to play, a hand with a broad compassion agenda that played out in Africa this week, read about the Tribune's interview with the first lady:

Five girls from villages in Senegal awarded the first of many scholarships for schoolgirls in Africa under President Bush's Africa Education Initiative, part of a multibillion-dollar aid package that Laura Bush showcased in a four-nation tour. Photo by Mark Silva

by Mark Silva

KENNEBUNKPORT, Me. – The White House, cautioning people against getting too "spun up'' over attempted bombings in Great Britain, nevertheless said today that security has been heightened at major airports in the United States – though the overall security level has not been raised.

President Bush, spending a long weekend at his father's retreat on the coast of Maine for a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin, has been getting briefings about the attempted bombing in London and now assault on the Glasgow airport today before and after a bike-ride in the Maine woods – even getting an update during his bike outing.

The Walker's Point summer home of the former President Bush, where Presidents Bush and Putin will meet. Photo by Nina Sichel

Andrew Zajac

Rachel Brand, the Assistant U.S. Attorney for Legal Policy, becomes the seventh high-ranking Justice Department official to leave since January when Congress began poking into the circumstances surrounding the departures of nine U.S. attorneys.

by Frank James

Today's Supreme Court's rare decision to reverse itself and to hear the habeas claim of Guantamo detainees caps what has been a very bad week for President Bush which included the death of the his immigration bill in the Senate, and Senate allies parting company with him on Iraq policy.

This is part of the report on the Supreme Court move by the Los Angeles Time's David Savage:

WASHINGTON -- In a surprise move, the Supreme Court agreed today to take up the case of the prisoners at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and to decide whether they have been wrongly held for years without a fair chance to plead their innocence.

The issue is not a new one. Five years ago, when the Bush administration began sending foreigners to the island prison, civil libertarians said they deserved a fair hearing to determine who they were and why they were being held.

by Frank James

It's a given that Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-Ill.) and her husband are very popular with African-Americans, a popularity that was on display at last night's Democratic debate at Howard University.

Gallup's pollsters have a new survey that indicates just how highly thought of she is among African Americans but Hispanics as well.

According to the poll, 84 percent of blacks rated her favorably while only 10 percent viewed her negatively. That compared with 68 percent of blacks who view Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) positively and eight percent unfavorably.

Gallup's report had this amusing explanation of Clinton's strength with black voters:

Due to his strong support in the African-American community, some have cleverly referred to former President Bill Clinton as America's "first black president." Blacks also view his wife Hillary Clinton positively, with 84% rating her favorably and only 10% unfavorably.

Blacks also have positive views of Obama, who is seeking to become the first official black president.

So does that make the former president the first black president, unofficially?

by Frank James

The discovery of the London car bomb has jangled nerves on this side of the Atlantic and is drawing responses from Washington officials and terrorism experts.

Secretary Michael Chertoff of the Homeland Security Department issued the following statement:

We have been in close contact with our counterparts in the U.K. regarding the suspected explosive device discovered in a vehicle in the London Haymarket area. Our law enforcement and intelligence officials are closely monitoring the ongoing investigation.

At this point, I have seen no specific, credible information suggesting that this incident is connected to a threat to the homeland. We have no plans at this time to change the U.S. threat level. DHS and the FBI have been in touch with our state and local homeland security and law enforcement partners to convey available information.

We encourage the public to enjoy the upcoming holiday but ask, as always, that they be vigilant and report any suspicious activities to authorities.

by Mark Silva

BAMAKO, Mali – “Woof, woof, woof,’’ said Jenna Bush, daughter of the president, smiling as she handed reversible hand puppets of Kitty, the first cat, and Barney, the first dog, to giggling children in the shade of a school courtyard.

Here with her mother, First Lady Laura Bush, to showcase the educational support with the United States is lending to some 700 schools in Mali, this marked the closing of a four-day African odyssey campaigning against disease and for education.

In Mali, a landlocked nation of 12 million nearly twice the size of Texas and mostly desert or semi-arid, it is neither AIDS nor malaria that poses the greatest problem – though a malaria eradication program sponsored by the U.S. is getting underway here.

by Frank James

Some thoughts on last night's Howard University debate before a mostly African-American audience of the Democratic presidential candidates.

One of the most interesting politicians on the stage was not even running for president. Introducing the candidates was Gov. Deval Patrick, the first African-American elected governor of Massachusetts, who radiated poise, intelligence and vigor. The thought probably went through a lot of minds that they were looking at a future presidential candidate in Patrick.

All the candidates started off the debate with the obligatory denunciation of the Supreme Court's ruling on school desegregation from earlier in the day. Curiously, immigration never came up, further proof perhaps that it is indeed a dead letter.

By Jim Tankersley

Want proof that it pays for a state to snag a seat on the powerful Senate Appropriations Committee? Look no further than Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), who has already tagged about $350 million for Illinois projects in spending bills approved by the committee.
Durbin, who has extra juice as the second-ranking Democrat in the Senate, has issued a steady stream of press releases this month -- like he does every year -- to tout so-called "earmarks" in funding bills for homeland security, energy, military construction, health and education and the environment.
He figures to ring up more money for the state next month, when the appropriations process resumes after a week-long July 4 recess. Of course, any money depends on final approval from the full Senate, the House and ultimately President Bush.
Among the projects Durbin has already pushed through committee: a bridge over the Illinois River near Morris, a new child development center at Scott Air Force Base, an outpatient veterans' medical clinic in North Chicago, math and science education in East St. Louis, barriers to keep Asian Carp and other invasive species out of the Great Lakes and a variety of flood-control efforts.
Here's Durbin's full list of earmarks secured so far, according to his office:

by Leora Falk
The Clinton campaign's spin people say she stands out because she had experience. The Obama people, implicated in the Clinton stress on experience, say that that experience is a dangerous nostalgia and a backwards-looking way of leading a country. The Edwards people said that he straddles his two Americas and he wants to make it one America, and no it doesn't matter that he won't be the first anything—black, woman, or Latino—president. He won't even be the first John, but he'll be the one standing in the end.

The Biden people will tell you that yes, he really did make a comment about condoms that took some in the audience by surprise, but they needed to hear it, even if they don't know that. The Kucinich, Dodd and Richardson campaigns don't bother with spin people. They give you the candidate in the flesh, complete with the sweat that's inevitable after standing on a stage and then moving to address throngs of press.

Welcome to the spin room, where every candidate performed better than everyone other candidate in last night’s debate and where the thirty-second to one minute debate answers are fodder for massive amounts of analysis, clearly marked with placards and hand-held signs so you know which campaign is producing which spin.

by Frank James

A quick quided tour of some of the morning's most important or interesting (or both) Washington-related stories.

Immigration-reform efforts died in Congress after the Senate failed to keep alive on a procedural vote legislation supported by President Bush that would have provided a path to citizenship for the 12 million illegal immigrants. The failure set back hopes for action until 2009 at the earliest.

The immigration bill was defeated in part by the high level of outrage in small-town America, especially in the South and Midwest where many illegal Latin American immigrants have gone in recent years.

The Supreme Court narrowed the use of race in school desegregation efforts, striking down two voluntary integration plans in Louisville, Ky. and Seattle, Wash. that the court said violated the Constitution.

by Mark Silva

LUSAKA, Zambia – First Lady Laura Bush, nearing the end of a weeklong African odyssey showcasing a U.S. campaign against AIDS and malaria, said this here: “This trip has been very inspiring to me, because I have heard so many terrific stories – very tragic stories, but with hope.’’

She listened to girls speak of abuse and rape. She saw them cry.

She listened to orphans of AIDS, and there are millions in Africa. She met one man with AIDS whose daughter is making money now as a photographer, and heard his hope for her future. She met a woman who, with a family of 18, has seen four get HIV.

She is heading home today, or to the Bush family summer home, via Mali, making her second cross-continent flight on a five-day, four-nation tour that will deliver her late tonight to the family resort at Kennebunkport, Me.

Good morning.

Here are a few Washington events of note for Friday, June 29, 2007 as collected by the Associated Press.

First Lady Laura Bush finishes her four-nation trip to Africa and heads home.

June 29 - July 2. BAPTISTS — The American Baptist Churches USA holds its biennial convention.
Location: Washington Convention Center

by Leora Falk

The Barack Obama fans and volunteers who gathered at Howard University for a self-described pep-rally for Obama were in for a suprise. As they walked from the metro station they prepped themselves for displaying a show of support without a showing from their candidate.

"What do you mean, we're not going to see him? We're not even going to see the debate?" one disgruntled student muttered. "No. We're just here to show how much we support him," her friend answered as the two of them joined others holding Obama '08 signs and wearing Obama t-shirts. But just as the cheers were getting softer and someone quipped she would like "an Obama water" Obama himself pulled up to the curb.

by Jim Tankersley

Big week for Dick Lugar. First, the Republican senator from Indiana drew headlines for criticizing President Bush's troop "surge" strategy in Iraq on the Senate floor.

Then today, he and a wannabe president, Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.), announced they've snared nearly $50 million for an eponymous initiative to intercept and destroy weapons stockpile – including weapons of mass destruction – worldwide.

Funding for the so-called "Lugar-Obama nonproliferation initiative" would "be used to destroy conventional weapons stockpiles, intercept weapons of mass destruction and respond to proliferation emergencies," according to a joint release from the senators. If approved by both chambers and signed into law, the money would complete a bipartisan effort Lugar and Obama launched in 2005.

Here's the full text from the joint release:

By Jim Tankersley

Democrats are breaking out the political fireworks a little early this Independence Day (ok, sue us – we couldn't resist), with ads lighting up Rep. Mark Kirk (R-Ill.) and 13 other Republican House incumbents on veterans' issues.

Undeterred by Kirk's other job – he's a naval intelligence officer who works a weekend a month at the Pentagon – the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee will criticize what a spokesman dubs Kirk's "dismal record" on military pay, veterans' benefits and veterans' health care in a Web video and a series of automated phone calls next week.

The push targets voters in Kirk's suburban Chicago district, which is one of the few in the nation held by a Republican but won by Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) in the 2004 presidential election. (Translation: Democrats think they can win there; two candidates – Dan Seals, who nearly beat Kirk in 2006, and former Clinton administration official Jay Footlik, have announced plans to challenge Kirk in 2008.)

Kirk's office fired back with a picture of the congressman in a flight suit in Kosovo, a reminder of his miliary service and a shot at Seals:

"It is ironic that the Democrat Party would take a partisan shot at Congressman Kirk, a Navy combat veteran and drilling reservist, when their own candidate, Dan Seals never served and does not live in the district," said Kenilworth Mayor Tolbert Chisum, a former Marine, in a release from Kirk's office.

Added Kirk spokesman Eric Elk: “Congressman Kirk just voted for the largest increase in funding for veterans health care (H.R. 2642, June 15, 2007, roll call no.498, $3.8 billion above the President’s budget ) and will break ground on the new $100 million 10th District Navy/VA hospital next week."

by Frank James

President Bush's visit to the Naval War College in Newport, R.I. today was clearly an effort by the White House to neutralize voices like Sens. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.) and George Voinovich (R-Ohio) who earlier this week called for the U.S. to intelligently draw down its forces in Iraq and refocus its Middle East efforts on non-military approaches like diplomacy.

Both lawmakers gave voice to growing concerns among Capitol Hill Republicans that the military surge is too little, too late.

While the president didn't mention them by name, he strove to provide a counterargument to theirs today, offering examples how the surge is working.

It was an attempt to buy time, to hold back the floodgates of other Republicans who might feel liberated to publicly criticize the present policy now that the highly respected Lugar and his fellow conservative Voinovich have led the way.

Perhaps it was appropriate that Bush appeared at a naval educational institution since he was trying to keep the tide of GOP support from running out on him, isolating him further.

The speech was also the latest in a now seemingly endless number of Iraq speeches by Bush the meant to take his case directly to the American people and over the Washington filter.

One of the arguments, Lugar and Voinovich made was that the surge was not in the U.S.'s national interest. Bush took that point on frontally.

It's a new mission, and David Petraeus is in Iraq carrying it out. Its goal is to help the Iraqis make progress toward reconciliation, to build a free nation that respects the rights of its people, upholds the rule of law and is an ally against the extremists in this war. And it's in our interest -- it's in our national interest -- to help them succeed.

America has sent reinforcements to help the Iraqis secure their population. In other words, one of the decisions I had to make was, what should our troop levels be? I asked the military what they thought the troop levels ought to be. That's what you expect from your commander-in-chief, to consult closely with the United States military in times of war.

They made recommendations, and I sent the reinforcements in to help the Iraqis secure their population, to go after terrorists, insurgents and militias that incite sectarian violence and to help get this capital of Iraq under control. The last of the reinforcements arrived in Iraq earlier this month, and the full surge has begun. One of our top commanders, Ray Odierno, puts it this way: We are beyond a surge of forces, and we're now into a surge of operations.

By David Lightman of the Hartford Courant

As key Republican support for President Bush’s Iraq war strategy begins to erode, Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman today urged fellow lawmakers and the public to give the American military surge time to work.

“We’ve got to think not about the next election but the next generation,” he told a Capitol Hill news conference.

The U.S. military surge, Lieberman contended, has the enemy “on the run.” The Connecticut senator, an independent who caucuses with Democrats, has been one of the Senate’s most vocal war backers, and would not let up today. His comments came three days after Sen. Richard G. Lugar, (R-Ind)., the highly respected top Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, as well as Sen. George Voinovich, (R-Ohio), urged the White House to change course and begin, as Lugar put it, to downsize U.S. involvement in Iraq.

“In my judgment, the costs and risks of continuing down the current path outweigh the potential benefits that can be achieved,” said Lugar in a Senate floor speech Monday. “Persisting indefinitely with the surge strategy will delay policy adjustments that have a better chance of protecting our vital interests over the long term.”

By Martin Evans of Newsday

Hillary Rodham Clinton's presidential campaign has gathered an additional $27 million in campaign contributions over the past three months, but will finish behind rival Senator Barack Obama in the money-collecting sweepstakes, a key Clinton aide said.

"To put that figure in some perspective, it is more than any Democrat has ever raised in the second quarter of the "off" year," campaign aide Howard Wolfson said in an e-mailed message. "While that figure is record setting, we do expect Senator Obama to significantly outraise us this quarter."

by Frank James

President Bush was in the Newport, Rhode Island, delivering a speech on staying the new course in Iraq when the Senate failed to amass the needed 60 votes to keep the immigration bill alive.

Following the Iraq speech, an obviously glum Bush spoke briefly to reporters about the immigration vote:

PRESIDENT BUSH: I thank the members of the Senate and members of my administration who worked so hard on the border security and immigration reform bill. I'm sorry the Senate was unable to reach agreement on the bill this morning.

Legal immigration is one of the top concerns of the American people, and Congress's failure to act on it is a disappointment. The American people understand the status quo is unacceptable when it comes to our immigration laws. A lot of us worked hard to see if we couldn't find common ground. It -- it didn't work.

Congress really needs to prove to the American people that it can come together on hard issues. The Congress needs to work on comprehensive energy policy and health care, making sure health care is affordable without inviting the federal government to run the health care system. We got to work together to make sure we can balance this federal budget and not overspend or raise taxes on the American people. And we got a lot of work to do.

When they come back from the summer -- from the July recess, before the summer break begins, we'll be focusing on the appropriations process. And I look forward to working with Congress to balance our budgets and to be wise about how we spend the people's money.

Thank you for your time.

Q Are you sorry you didn't do more personally to lobby the members of your own party, sir?

(No audible response as Bush turned and walked out the building.)