Followers of the Democratic presidential campaign got the moment they've been waiting months for: A fight between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. Five months after the dust-up over David Geffen and about as many months until the Iowa caucuses, the mud slinging has begun.
Yesterday Clinton told the Quad-City Times' Ed Tibbetts that Obama was "irresponsible and frankly naive" to be willing to meet face-to-face with the dictators of Iran, Syria, North Korea, Cuba and Venezuela without preconditions.
The New York Times' Patrick Healy gives the play-by-play: hours after Monday's debate and the answers about diplomacy, Clinton advisers began to argue Obama's response was "too soft" while Obama advisers said he wasn't promising meetings but just willing to consider them and that Clinton is like President Bush because he rejects meeting with the heads of those countries. Next, the Obama campaign fired off a memo saying he'd use "tough diplomacy" as president and Clinton was opposed to using every tool to solve foreign problems.
Clinton struck back, saying Obama regretted his answer from the debate, which was "irresponsible and frankly naive." (Audio here.) After Clinton's response, her campaign arranged for reporters to speak to Bill Clinton and former secretary of state Madeleine Albright, who supports Clinton. A memo reiterating Clinton's position was also released.
After these moves by the Clinton camp, Obama gave his own interview to the Quad-City Times (audio) and said Clinton created a "fabricated controversy" over the answer. "What she's somehow maintaining is my statement could be construed as not having asked what the meeting was about," he said. "I didn't say these guys were going to come over for a cup of coffee some afternoon." Obama then turned Clinton's words against her, saying it was "irresponsible and naive" to vote to authorize the Iraq war.
Just when it looked like Democratic politics couldn't get more interesting, an anonymous flier surfaced in South Carolina, accusing Obama of favoring early release for sex offenders -- putting his image next to those of Michael Dukakis and Willie Horton. Marc Ambinder writes that Obama's South Carolina operation "doesn't know where it came from and therefore has no one to blame. Clinton's campaign disclaims any knowledge." The charge "leveled at Obama lacks evidence and the citation appears to distort a 1999 state senate vote on prisoner sentencing" that expanded "good times credits" for convicts.
Obama launched a radio ad in the state today, focusing on black voters. (Audio here.) In it, Obama ticks off problems facing blacks and the announcer describes him as a Christian family man, a former civil rights lawyer and state legislator.
Meanwhile, Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) is expected to endorse Clinton today, reports the San Francisco Chronicle's Carla Marinucci. In Nevada, Clinton added more than 100 "prominent Nevada women supporters" to her campaign.
On the Republican side, Fred Thompson shook up his nascent campaign team "amid fears he was losing momentum and needed an injection of talent," reports The Politico's Jonathan Martin and Mike Allen. Operations chief Tom Collamore has been replaced with political director and Florida hand Randy Enwright after advisers soured on Collamore. Former Sen. Spencer Abraham (R-MI) will be the campaign's "ambassador to Washington."
Rudy Giuliani is adding direct-mail to his Iowa campaign efforts after launching radio ads there this week. In California yesterday, Giuliani said judges who are not "strict constructionists" imperil democracy. "What 'strict constructionist' means is that a judge will interpret the Constitution in accordance with what someone else meant when they wrote those words and not try to legislate," Giuliani said. "If you are not a strict constructionist, I believe you imperil the American democracy because you take the role of a legislator."
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