Edwards aims appeals to Dean fans

AUGUSTA, Ga. - With a new poll showing him trailing Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry in Georgia three days before the Super Tuesday primaries, Sen. John Edwards on Saturday tried to convince the state's Democrats that he has the best chance of defeating President Bush.

Edwards conceded that his hopes of overtaking Kerry may depend on victories or very strong showings in Georgia, Minnesota, Maryland and Ohio, four of the 10 states that have primaries or caucuses on Tuesday.

"But we have to win in these states that are so critical for us," Edwards told an African-American crowd at a church in the Georgia capital. "My campaign has been attracting all these independent voters that we have to get to win a general election."

Later on Saturday, Edwards continued to court supporters of former Vermont governor Howard Dean. Edwards, who'd already picked up support from former Dean leaders in New York, Ohio and Minnesota, spoke on a conference call to grass roots Dean supporters in a dozen states.

INDIANAPOLIS - Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry on Saturday criticized President Bush's replacement of two dissenting members of a bioethics panel that advises him on such issues as cloning and stem cell research.

". . . A scientific panel ought to be chosen on the basis of science and on the basis of reputation, not politics," the Massachusetts senator told reporters during a refueling stop on a flight from Oakland, Calif., to New York.

". . . I think that is the wrong thing to do when a country is searching for its appropriate scientific policy. We deserve to have people whose reputations and abilities are not tarnished and are not focused by politics or religion."

Elizabeth Blackburn, a cell biologist at the University of California at San Francisco and former president of the American Society for Cell Biology, and William F. May, a medical ethicist and retired professor at Southern Methodist University, were dismissed Friday from the President's Council on Bioethics.

Bush created the council in 2001, replacing a similar commission that advised President Clinton, to tackle issues including embryonic stem cell research, euthanasia and assisted reproduction. He named its 17 members to two-year terms in January 2002.

The White House did not respond directly to earlier allegations that Blackburn and May were replaced for ideological reasons.

WASHINGTON - President Bush's campaign strategists say they now expect to trail or do no better than run even with Sen. John Kerry through the summer, despite their aggressive new effort to counter Democratic attacks.

Some Republicans said the campaign's assessment was intended to lower expectations and convince jittery supporters that the election is unfolding just as the White House anticipated.

But they said it also reflected a belief that the president had his work cut out for him in getting back on the offensive after a period in which events outside Bush's control and concerted Democratic criticism had undermined his political strength.

After Tuesday's primaries in 10 states, the White House plans to step up a counterassault that began last Monday when Bush delivered his first speech of the general election campaign, officials said.

Bush will make a foray into the heart of the Democratic base, visiting California on Wednesday and Thursday to collect more money toward his goal of raising $175 million or more to last him through the summer. He will start putting his war chest to work in earnest on Thursday when he begins running television advertising.

"As this becomes a two-man race, we need to define the stakes," said Terry Holt, the Bush campaign's spokesman.

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