Monday, June 30, 2008

30. Congress is not in session this holiday week, and President Bush's schedule has lightened up, too. Today, Bush will attend the feel-good presidential photo op of the summer, a T-ball game on the South Lawn of the White House.

Bush inaugurated the annual games, played by children ages 4 to 7, on the South Lawn in 2001. In the final summer of his presidency, the White House will also host the first T-ball all-star game on the "first field," later this month.

Meanwhile, liberal policy wonks are not yet ready to slather on the sunscreen: The Center for American Progress and the Hyde Park Project will sponsor their first summer session of "McCain University" -- a nearly day-long series of presentations critiquing the presumptive Republican nominee's proposals on national security, the environment, health care and the economy.

In addition to the usual Democratic policy wonks, such as Gene Sperling, Rand Beers and Jared Bernstein, the forum will feature Elizabeth Edwards -- an increasingly vocal health-care policy advocate since she received a diagnosis of terminal cancer and her husband, former senator John Edwards, ended his second bid for the Democratic presidential nomination this spring.

In the afternoon, the idea of democracy taking a holiday gets a more literal gloss when Freedom House hosts a briefing with representatives of Zimbabwe's opposition political party. Civil society organizations and the State Department will also join in to discuss the political and humanitarian crises in Zimbabwe, brought about by the recent anti-democratic actions of President Robert Mugabe.

2. Summer silliness continues Wednesday as National Geographic Kids magazine will attempt to set a Guinness world record for the world's longest chain of shoes. Roughly 10,500 shoes will be laid out in the National Geographic Society's courtyard in Northwest Washington, extending for an estimated two miles.

Over on Capitol Hill, the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee will ignore the holiday recess and conduct a full committee hearing on "Securing the Northern Border." The committee will examine the impact of tightened border security efforts in light of the fact that, although most congressional and public attention on immigration tends to focus on America's southern border, the border with Canada has proved more suitable to al-Qaeda plotters and the odd man carrying extremely drug-resistant tuberculosis.

4. Bring on the barbecues and fireworks (legal and otherwise)! Independence Day on Friday provides, as ever, the occasion for a wide array of festivities in the Washington area. Some local highlights include a day-long festival at Mount Vernon, the home of George Washington; a morning reading ceremony of the Declaration of Independence at the National Archives; a parade down Constitution Avenue; a concert on the Washington Monument grounds; and, of course, the annual fireworks display on the Mall. This year's show, produced by Pyro Shows of LaFollette, Tenn., will feature more than 2,800 shells, collectively weighing more than 14,000 pounds.

-- Garance Franke-Ruta