UPDATE 1-Bloomberg to attend '08 campaign 'unity' talks
(Adds McCain reaction)
By JoAnne Allen
WASHINGTON, Dec 30 (Reuters) - A bipartisan group of U.S. political figures will meet next week to urge presidential candidates to close the partisan divide, the meeting's hosts said on Sunday, amid speculation New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg will run as an independent.
Bloomberg, outgoing Republican Sen. Chuck Hagel of Nebraska, both considered potential independent White House hopefuls, and more than a dozen current and retired lawmakers and others are scheduled to attend the closed-door discussions at the University of Oklahoma on Jan. 7.
Eight Democrats and seven Republicans, many of whom have been campaigning for more than a year, are vying for the right to face off in the Nov. 4 general election to choose a successor to Republican President George W. Bush, who will leave office after two terms.
Bloomberg, 65, has denied publicly that he intends to run for office but with a multi-billion-dollar fortune at his disposal, speculation about a bid has continued. In Monday's editions, The New York Times said Bloomberg's aides had been laying groundwork for a candidacy.
Former Oklahoma Sen. David Boren, one of the co-hosts of the meeting, told The Washington Post the meeting was not called to encourage any one person to run.
But in an interview with the Times, Boren said he would "be among those who would urge Mr. Bloomberg to very seriously consider running for president as an independent" if the current candidates are not able to take a bipartisan approach to the nation's problems.
The Times said in private conversations Bloomberg has discussed his interest in running.
Boren, now president of the University of Oklahoma, and co-host Sam Nunn, a former senator from Georgia, said they want their meeting to have discussions on the serious challenges that cannot be met without a consensus government.
"Our political system is, at the very least, badly bent and many are concluding that it is broken at a time where America must lead boldly at home and abroad," Nunn and Boren wrote in a letter to participants.
"Partisan polarization is preventing us from uniting to meet the challenges that we must face if we are to prevent further erosion of America's power of leadership and example," they wrote.
Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain played down the Oklahoma meeting.
"I don't have any comment except to say that I know that Mayor Bloomberg can write a check for a sizable amount of money. You hear all this stuff ... but frankly I don't pay any attention to it," McCain told reporters at a campaign stop in Newport, New Hampshire.
The meeting will come three days after Iowa voters select their favorites for the presidential nominations and one day before New Hampshire voters to do the same.
Bloomberg, a longtime Democrat, became a Republican to run for mayor and switched to independent in June 2007.
The self-made billionaire founded Bloomberg LP, a news and information company and a Reuters competitor, before running for mayor as a political novice in 2001. (Additional reporting by Jeremy Pelofsky; Editing by Bill Trott) (To read more about the U.S. political campaign, visit Reuters "Tales from the Trail: 2008" online at blogs.reuters.com/trail08/)
