Posted: March 5, 2008 6:54 PM
Obama Takes Media to Task as Campaigns Push On
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After losses to New York Sen. Hillary Clinton in the Ohio and Texas primaries, it was Illinois Sen. Barack Obama’s turn to gripe about the media.
“There’s no doubt that Senator Clinton went very negative over the last week,” he said, according to the Associated Press. He said her campaign’s multiple attacks “had some impact” on the election results “particularly in the context where many of you in the press corps had been persuaded that you had been too hard on her and too soft on me.”
“Complaining about the refs apparently worked a little bit this week,” he said, equating members of the news media with referees in a sporting event.
The New York Times reported that the Clinton campaign’s complaints against the media may have turned the spotlight on him rather than her now-vanquished losing streak.
“Mr. Obama was the subject of 69 percent of all campaign articles last week, from Feb. 25 to March 2, and Mrs. Clinton was the subject of 58 percent of articles about the election, according to a study by the Project for Excellence in Journalism.”
Obama vowed that he would start to raise more doubt about Clinton’s claims of Washington and foreign policy experience after he lost to her in the Ohio and Texas primaries. “What exactly is this foreign policy experience?” Obama asked, according to the AP. “Was she negotiating treaties? Was she handling crises? The answer is no.”
In TV interviews Wednesday, Clinton listed foreign policy situations in which she played a role, including peace talks in Northern Ireland, the Kosovo refugee crisis and pushing for women’s rights in China. She also cited her work on the Senate Armed Services Committee.
Obama aides sent out a memo and held a conference call to question why Clinton won’t release her tax returns, the AP reported. The Clinton campaign responded with a statement e-mailed to reporters that said the Clintons’ returns since they left the White House will be made public around April 15.
Tuesday’s races closed the delegate gap between Clinton and Obama to some extent. Clinton won at least 185 delegates and Obama won at least 173, according to AP projections. Her Ohio victory appears to have won her only nine more delegates than Obama, with two still to be awarded. In Texas, she won four more delegates than Obama in the primary. But he appeared trimmed her lead to a single Texas delegate as the results of party caucuses were tabulated. There were still 10 delegates to be awarded in the caucuses.
More than two months after the Iowa caucuses, the Democratic race is almost certainly guaranteed to continue at least another seven weeks. Pennsylvania Democrats vote April 22 in a closed primary, which excludes independents and cross-party “Obamacans.”
“Pennsylvania is the new Iowa,” Clinton spokesman Doug Hattaway told Politico.
The relatively cordial campaign between the top two Democrats is expected to turn toward more mud-slinging as the candidates battle for the remaining delegates.
“The up-with-people phase of this contest is over,” Politico predicted. “The clear-the-benches phase has begun - a brawl that now is more likely than not to continue until the Democratic nomination in late August.”
The candidates will compete over the next week in Wyoming and Mississippi before a long stretch of campaigning before Pennsylvania’s 158 delegates are up for grabs.
But as the candidates clash over delegates, it will certainly make for great political — and possibly legal — drama.
“Both Obama and Clinton are resting their candidacies on arguments that are fundamentally true,” Politico continued. “Obama is right that, at least by conventional standards, she has little prospect of overcoming his delegate lead. There are not enough states and delegates still on the table.”
One possible way for the candidates to avoid an even-more-protracted primary battle would be the unlikely possibility that one Democrat would agree to be the other’s running mate.
“We talked to a lot of people in Ohio who said there really isn’t that significant a difference between you two, and they’d like to see you both on the ticket,” anchor Harry Smith told Clinton on CBS’ morning program Wednesday.
She replied: “Well, you know, that may be where this is headed. But of course we have to decide who is on the top of the ticket. I think the people of Ohio very clearly said that it should be me.”
Obama brushed off the question. “We are just focused on winning this nomination,” he said. “I think it is premature to start talking about a joint ticket.”
-- By , NewsHour with Jim Lehrer | Comments | Link
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"A good storyteller is a person who has a good memory and hopes other people haven't."
-Irvin S. Cobb
Most voters that are 35 years or younger should read up on the Clintons; unfortunately the old folks have short term memory. The Clintons have done a good job to intimidate the media so that their past will not be vetted out. Here are some of the issues to research before casting your vote for Senator Hillary: Whitewater, Travelgate, Monica Lewinsky and impeachment, renting out the Lincoln bedroom, the loss of the Rose Law Firm billing records for nearly 2 years until they were miraculously found in the White House living quarters, removing files from Vince Foster's office following his suicide and before investigators could get there.
Senator Hillary Clinton is really the one with all attack speeches and no results. She claims that she has been fighting for poor people for 35 years and she has a plan to eliminate children poverty by 2012. According to U.S. Census bureau, Arkansas state ranked 49th in people with college degree (almost dead-last) and 6th in people living below poverty level. The truth is: technology boom did far more for the good economy of the 90's than Bill Clinton. For example, Mark Cuban became a billionaire within 4 years! Billary have nothing to do with it.
If Hillary cannot lift a small state like Arkansas out of poverty, why believe that she can eliminate children poverty by 2012 accross big cities in America?
Answer=empty promises
I am so disappointed with PBS. I have yet to see an analysis of the inherant differance between a "top down" campaigne and a "bottom up" movement, an all that should imply. I have relied upon PBS, for so many years to be able to see beyond the surface issues and open up the discussion to a deeper level. Shame, shame on you.
Wake Up!!!..before you become part of the problem and not a part of the solution,,,Which I have always believed that you were but am having doubts that you have become.
nat. `
why was this not reported on before the election?
Report: NAFTA-Gate Leaker Said Hillary's People Were Reassuring Canada, Too
By Eric Kleefeld - March 5, 2008, 11:33PM
The NAFTA-Gate controversy has taken another turn, one that could potentially boomerang back on Hillary Clinton after initially damaging Barack Obama.
The Canadian Press � Canada's domestic equivalent of the AP � is reporting that the original source of the leak was Ian Brodie, chief of staff to Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper. And as it turns out, Brodie's original conversation with reporters focused much more on Hillary as the candidate whose people were reassuring Canada that the anti-trade rhetoric was all just campaign talk.
"He said someone from Clinton's campaign is telling the Embassy to take it with a grain of salt," said one participant in the conversation. The source added, "someone called us and told us not to worry."
Hillary's people were able to use NAFTA-Gate very effectively in questioning Obama's honesty in the Ohio and Texas campaigns, ultimately pulling off some decent wins. But if this thing doesn't die down, and the focus turns from Obama over to Hillary, they could very well see the story come back to bite them.
this needs to be talked about!
Report: NAFTA-Gate Leaker Said Hillary's People Were Reassuring Canada, Too
By Eric Kleefeld - March 5, 2008, 11:33PM
The NAFTA-Gate controversy has taken another turn, one that could potentially boomerang back on Hillary Clinton after initially damaging Barack Obama.
The Canadian Press � Canada's domestic equivalent of the AP � is reporting that the original source of the leak was Ian Brodie, chief of staff to Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper. And as it turns out, Brodie's original conversation with reporters focused much more on Hillary as the candidate whose people were reassuring Canada that the anti-trade rhetoric was all just campaign talk.
"He said someone from Clinton's campaign is telling the Embassy to take it with a grain of salt," said one participant in the conversation. The source added, "someone called us and told us not to worry."
Hillary's people were able to use NAFTA-Gate very effectively in questioning Obama's honesty in the Ohio and Texas campaigns, ultimately pulling off some decent wins. But if this thing doesn't die down, and the focus turns from Obama over to Hillary, they could very well see the story come back to bite them.
It is a bit of a disappointment that Clinton managed to win the Ohio and Texas primaries by negative campaigning to undermine the strengths of Obama, instead of the value her candidacy may bring to the country. This is George Bush's game, to win by dividing people and consequently dividing the country.