The Editor's Desk

The way Harold Ford Jr. tells the story, our Jonathan Darman was walking alongside the Memphis congressman in the annual Mule Day Parade in Columbia, Tenn., interviewing him about his prospects as an African-American Democrat running for the U.S. Senate in a Southern state. An ancient custom in middle Tennessee (the first was held in 1840), Mule Day is a festival dedicated to--well, mules. This year, as Ford was campaigning with Darman in tow, the two came within sight of a group of Sons of Confederate Veterans dressed in battle gray. Ford grew nervous: he did not think it would look good for him to be hanging out with a reporter from a national magazine. "Hey," Ford recalled saying to Darman, "you've got to walk a little bit behind me. These guys already think I'm a little crazy. I got enough problems on my own." Ever gentlemanly, Jon agreed.

As Jon, the author of this week's cover story, slowed down, Ford worked the Confederate caucus with hugs and high-fives--an interesting encounter, to say the least. The news at the time was President Bush's proposal to lease the management of some American ports to a Dubai company--a plan Ford opposed. Amid the locals, Ford declined to wear a Confederate battle-flag sticker, but listened happily as one voter said, "Boy, I know who you are--you're the one who doesn't want to sell our ports to the Arabs." The scene, which Ford recounted to NEWSWEEK editors in an interview, illustrates what he has to do to win: convince enough voters in a generally Republican state that he is, as we say in our cover line, not your daddy's Democrat. Ford's hope? That voters will see him as a pragmatist who has moved beyond the liberal orthodoxy that has tended to consign the Democrats to defeat in the South, and nationally, since 1968. Not so long ago, 2006 looked to be a year of lefty anger; as the seasons shift and autumn comes, however, many of the most competitive House and Senate candidates, in Pennsylvania, Virginia, Missouri and elsewhere, are the ones who are stressing their centrism.

Whether the Democrats would govern from the middle or swerve left, burying the Bush administration with subpoenas, is another question, and Michael Isikoff and Holly Bailey try to answer it. Richard Wolffe profiles Ford's opponent Bob Corker, and Ellis Cose weighs in on the "Bradley Effect," the phenomenon named after the late L.A. mayor Tom Bradley, who led in the polls only to lose on Election Day.

From Iraq, where U.S. forces are facing their deadliest month of 2006, Christian Caryl reports on the snipers and sectarian violence confronting soldiers on a base they call "the Alamo." Mark Hosenball and Christopher Dickey tell the tale of a shadowy probe into the world of nuclear proliferation, and in Washington, Dan Ephron explores the changing rules of interrogation.

In business, Keith Naughton assesses Wal-Mart's big gamble in China, and Johnnie L. Roberts chronicles the end of prime-time TV as we know it. In a conversation with the journalist Alex Kuczynski, Barbara Kantrowitz learns how Kuczynski's personal experience with cosmetic surgery helped inspire a new book--and a pledge to swear off further enhancements.

I grew up in Tennessee, so I confess that I have followed the Ford-Corker race with the enthusiasm of a native. Reading Darman's piece on the campaign, though, I think you will agree that, come election night, Ford's fate will tell a larger story, signaling what kind of Congress the president will face in the twilight of his term.