The Earlybird: Today's headlines

Energy push, global warming, return of CFR, missile tests, Va. gov debate, "ferocious" Michigan primary, Chandra update:

• Vice President Dick Cheney will moderate an invitation-only "town meeting" tonight at the Boyce Campus of Community College of Allegheny County, Pa., as part of a coordinated Bush administration effort to push its energy policy, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reports. Cheney will be joined by Sens. Rick Santorum (R) and Arlen Specter (R), and Rep. Melissa Hart (R).
• Other administration officials, AP reports, will hold similar meetings today in:
  • Sioux Falls, S.D. -- Interior Secretary Gale Norton and Rep. John Thune (R).
  • Monroe, N.C. -- Commerce Secretary Don Evans and Reps. Robin Hayes (R) and Sue Myrick (R).
  • Old Lyme, Conn. -- Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Christie Whitman and Rep. Rob Simmons, (R).
  • Argonne, Ill. -- Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham and Rep. Judy Biggert (R).
  • Euclid, Ohio -- Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta.
• As the Bush administration pushes its energy plan this week, "the sense of crisis that had propelled the plan forward has receded while energy shortages ease and fuel prices fall," the New York Times reports.

• The two-week conference on global warming that begins today in Bonn, Germany, "will shine the spotlight on a nation not accustomed to the international hot seat: Japan," the Washington Times reports.
• When President Bush travels to Europe later this week, European leaders plan to appeal to him for greater cooperation in dealing with global warming "by emphasizing the depth of dismay across their continent with U.S. policy and the dangers of a serious estrangement in transatlantic relations," the Washington Post reports.

• The New York Times reported Sunday that "for the second time in the last few months, former President George Bush has intervened in a critical foreign policy area, calling Crown Prince Abdullah of Saudi Arabia to reassure him that the current president's 'heart' is in the right place when it comes to the Middle East."
• The New York Times conducted a "six-month investigation" into the 2000 Florida recounts and found that under "intense pressure from the Republicans, Florida officials accepted hundreds of overseas absentee ballots that failed to comply with state election laws."

• After a brief "cooling-off period" over the weekend, Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., "plans to turn up the heat on House leaders this week to try to secure an up-or-down vote on the campaign finance reform measure that was shelved last week," Roll Call reports.
• Both moderates and conservatives in the House Republican Conference have complained bitterly about Speaker Dennis Hastert's handling of the campaign finance issue, "leaving unanswered questions about the speaker's ability to restore order in the ranks," the Washington Post reports.

• The presidents of Russia and China have signed their first treaty in more than half a century and have also found common ground in their opposition to U.S. missile defense plans, BBCNews.com reports.
• Saturday night's successful test of a prototype missile interceptor was denounced on Sunday by Russia's Foreign Ministry "as a threat to the global system of arms control," the Washington Post reports.

• Bush on Sunday invited two teams from Little League's Challenger League for children with disabilities to play in the third installment of his "Tee Ball on the South Lawn" program, Reuters reports.

• "The Bush administration is considering the option of granting legal residency to as many as 3 million illegal Mexican immigrants now living in the United States," the Washington Post reports.
• "Top military officials are holding up completion of the 'quadrennial defense review' at the Pentagon," U.S. News' "Washington Whispers" reports. "At meetings called to ID cuts, the brass have dug their heels in to protect pet programs, sources say."
• A Treasury Department sampling of service at Internal Revenue Service walk-in centers this year "found agents gave taxpayers incorrect or insufficient advice on their tax questions 73 percent of the time -- a slight improvement over last year's 81 percent error rate," Scripps Howard News Service reports.

• Virginia gubernatorial candidates Mark Earley (R) and Mark Warner (D) "clashed over creating human embryos solely for research Saturday at their first debate of the 2001 campaign," the Norfolk Virginian-Pilot reports.
• Iowa GOP gubernatorial hopefuls state Rep. Steve Sukup and businessman Bob Vander Plaats "debated the merits Friday of being a political outsider vs. a political insider," the Des Moines Register reports.
• New Jersey gubernatorial candidate Bret Schundler (R) will travel today to a "northern Michigan resort to trade campaign strategies with -- and attract support from -- a dozen or so Republican governors gathered for a regional conference hosted by the Republican Governors Association," the Newark Star-Ledger reports.
• Tim James (R), son of former Alabama Gov. Fob James (R), has announced that he will seek the Republican nomination to run for governor, AP reports.
• Roll Call reports that Rep. Rod Blagojevich, D-Ill., plans to announce his intention to run for governor when the congressional session ends.
• A poll conducted for "some power companies" in California shows Gov. Gray Davis' (D) "support is soft within his own party," the Los Angeles Times reports. In hypothetical primaries, Democratic Sens. Barbara Boxer and Dianne Feinstein were both chosen over Davis.
• A "ferocious gubernatorial campaign is under way" 13 months before the Democratic primary in Michigan, the Detroit News reports. One of the major issues is abortion, "and specifically, this question: Who among the pro-choice Democratic would-be governors is really pro-choice?"
• Philadelphia's "Democratic power brokers have defected to" former Mayor Ed Rendell's (D) gubernatorial rival, Auditor General Robert P. Casey Jr. (D), the Philadelphia Inquirer reports. "Casey has stitched together a diverse coalition of... Rendell's hometown legion of political enemies and disappointed friends," and he "has been able to call on help from allies of his father, the late Gov. Robert P. Casey."

• Erin Boggs (R), "the granddaughter of former Delaware Sen. J. Caleb Boggs (R), indicated she is contemplating' a challenge to Sen. Joe Biden (D), Roll Call reports.
• Massachusetts state Sen. Cheryl A. Jacques (D) "formally kicked off her campaign for the 9th Congressional District yesterday," the Boston Globe reports. The Boston Herald reports that "the openly gay Jacques staked a claim to the race's left flank."
• Former Massachusetts state Sen. Nancy Achin Sullivan (R) "may come out of political retirement to challenge" Rep. John F. Tierney, D-Mass., the Boston Globe reports.

• "Throughout Colorado, counties and towns are preparing to contest population counts because they believe the Census Bureau missed thousands of residents," the Rocky Mountain News reports.
• Anti-abortion activists began a week of rallies in Wichita, Kan., on Sunday with an estimated 1,100 people watching "a video that flashed onto a giant screen, displaying images of aborted fetuses and protesters being handled roughly by police," the Wichita Eagle reports.

• The Washington Post reports that the last time missing intern Chandra Levy used her laptop computer, she logged onto the Internet and "looked up a map site... for the Klingle Mansion in Rock Creek Park."
• Levy's family "has all but ruled out suicide as a reason for her disappearance and believes that if she was abducted, she probably knew her abductor," Reuters reports.
• The Levys' attorney said Sunday on "Meet the Press" that before "she vanished, Levy told her family that her boyfriend -- whom she called her 'secret lover' -- demanded she not carry identification when they were together," CNN.com reports.
• During an appearance on "Fox News Sunday," Senate Minority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss., called on Rep. Gary Condit, D-Calif., to resign if he "had a romantic relationship" with Levy, the Washington Times reports.
• The New York Post cites a Newsweek report that "Condit told cops he can't remember if he had sex with Chandra Levy the last time he saw her." The Post offers a timeline of events in the Levy case.
• Washington Police Chief Charles Ramsey said Sunday that "investigators have more questions for Condit," USA Today reports. Ramsey was "bristling... over the polygraph test that" Condit's "lawyer arranged last week without police input."

• Katharine Graham, chairman of the executive committee of the Washington Post Company, "fell Saturday afternoon on a walkway" in Sun Valley, Idaho, the Washington Post reports. She underwent surgery and "was reported in critical condition" in a Boise hospital on Sunday.
• A political action committee set up by Sen. Robert Torricelli, D-N.J., "raised $85,000 -- but reportedly has given less than $1,000 to the intended recipients," the New York Post reports.