Graham takes turn on other side of the lens

Sen. Bob Graham learned about the grueling duties of a sports photographer -- including the elaborate pregame buffet -- at the Orange Bowl last week.

During a stint for his trademark "workdays," Graham shot pictures for the Palm Beach Post. He says the job was a lot harder than he expected.

"It is a tough thing to get sports action photographs," Graham said. "You are working with a bulky piece of a equipment and a small frame. Once the action starts, they are moving so fast that it is hard to catch up with them."

A loyal Gator, Graham said he also had a difficult time being impartial during the Florida-Maryland game.

"It was hard to keep the Maryland players out of the picture," he joked. "They kept getting in."

Better than Geritol

In its latest edition, National Review magazine calls him The Stud. Newsweek says he's a sex symbol. No, they're not panting over the star-studded cast of Ocean's Eleven.

They're drooling over Donald Rumsfeld, the 69-year-old secretary of defense.

Since Sept. 11, when he took the podium at a Pentagon news briefing to reassure America things would be all right -- even as smoke wafted through the corridors -- Rumsfeld has emerged as the star of the Bush administration.

His news conferences, as one political cartoon put it, are the stuff of "must-see TV."

According to the National Review, which features a caricature of Rumsfeld in a pin-up pose accenting his posterior, people flock to watch him the way they do Oprah. To borrow a favorite Rumsfeld phrase, there's no question that he's a handsome fellow, with the perfectly sleeked hair and the million-dollar suits.

Asked about his newly discovered sex symbol status by CNN's Larry King, Rumsfeld said, "Oh, come on. For the AARP, perhaps."

If it's Tuesday, it must be . . .

Eight foreign cities in nine days.

That's the schedule Rep. Jim Davis, D-Tampa, will follow on a whirlwind trip through the Middle East with other members of the House International Relations Committee.

The tour will take Davis to cities in Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Israel, the Palestinian Authority, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. The delegation will meet with the U.S. ambassadors and heads of state, including Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Palestinian Authority leader Yasser Arafat.

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