Sink Rips White House

Now some fresh pickings from the Political Grapevine:

Can You Hear Me Now?

The blame game continues following the Democrats' heavy losses at the polls last week. Florida's Alex Sink, who narrowly lost to Republican Rick Scott in the governor's race, says the White House is tone-deaf.

Sink tells Politico the administration mishandled the response to the oil spill and didn't realize the extent of the political fallout from health care reform. Quote: "They got a huge wake-up call, but unfortunately they took a lot of Democrats down with them. They just need to be better listeners and be better at reaching out to people who are on the ground to hear about the realities of their policies as well as politics."

New Kids on the Block

New York City independent Mayor Michael Bloomberg doesn't think highly of the incoming freshmen who were elected to Congress. While traveling in Hong Kong over the weekend, Bloomberg told the Wall Street Journal -- quote: "If you look at the U.S., you look at who we're electing to Congress, to the Senate -- they can't read. I'll bet you a bunch of these people don't have passports. We're about to start a trade war with China if we're not careful here, only because nobody knows where China is. Nobody knows what China is."

We asked his office if the mayor felt the need to clarify his remarks, but have not heard back.

What Not to Wear

And finally, Japan is putting the no in kimono for this year's Asian Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting. World leaders were instructed to come in smart casual for Saturday's photo op.

Traditionally the group photo includes what have been called "silly shirts" often representing the host country's culture. Memorable photos include Indonesian batik shirts in 1994, Chilean ponchos in 2004, traditional Korean dress in 2005 and elegant silk tunics for 2006's meeting in Vietnam.