WASHINGTON -- Rep. Tom Reynolds, the campaign manager in charge of keeping the Republican majority in the House, gave his approval to a bid by House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Bill Thomas to force a tax bill through the September session of Congress.

Reynolds's opinion is given the highest weight, even more than Speaker Dennis Hastert's, in the current House Republican leadership meetings. These sessions have concentrated on what might help elect Republicans in November. Reynolds previously had been skeptical about the political value of a pre-election tax measure.

Thomas, in his typical style, has kept quiet on the details of what would be his final tax bill as he ends his congressional career. Not as usual, Thomas has been in contact with the Senate, indicating he means business.

OBAMA FOR PRESIDENT?

Prominent Illinois Democrats are advising Sen. Barack Obama, now finishing his second year in the Senate, to consider making a run for the 2008 presidential nomination.

One such Democratic stalwart is telling the 45-year-old Obama to run only if prospective front-runner Sen. Hillary Clinton does not. But others are advising the popular freshman senator to go for it even if Clinton is a candidate.

These boosters calculate that Obama, the son of a black father and a white mother, could break the Republican presidential hold on the South by maximizing the African-American vote in states such as South Carolina, Georgia and Mississippi.

KATHERINE'S WOES

Jim Dornan, one of the former managers of Rep. Katherine Harris's beleaguered Republican Senate candidacy in Florida, has told associates he was startled by how aggressively the FBI questioned him Sept. 6.

Dornan was interrogated for an hour and a half by federal agents as part of their inquiry into Harris's political contributions from defense contractor Mitchell Wade, who has pleaded guilty to bribery in another case. Dornan described the FBI as pressing him hard about Harris.

Dornan, a lobbyist and fund-raiser, is currently consulting for Rep. John Sweeney's re-election campaign in upstate New York. He left the Harris campaign last November. Continued...