"HILLARY" TORCHED

A group that opposes increasing cigarette taxes to fund health care reform burned Hillary Rodham Clinton in effigy Saturday -- as a Kentucky congressman and a gubernatorial candidate looked on. At a rally of about 100 people in Owensboro, Ky., Stan Arachikavitz, president of the state's Association of Tobacco Supporters, doused the dangling effigy with gasoline, then chanted "Burn, baby, burn!" as two women set it ablaze. Republican U.S. Rep. Ron Lewis and Democratic gubernatorial candidate Gatewood Galbraith, who moments before had delivered fiery speeches themselves, distanced themselves from the stunt's more violent implications: "I certainly wouldn't have done that," Lewis said. Galbraith commented: "I didn't see it as a hate thing." White House spokeswoman Dee Dee Myers called the stunt "unfortunate."