Clinton Advisers Warn Obama
There's more than meets the eye in that ongoing skirmish between Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama.
Clinton's advisers are using the fuss to send a warning shot. They want the Obama campaign to know that everything it does will be closely scrutinized from now on and that Obama won't be getting any free shots against Clinton.
The donnybrook started when Hollywood mogul David Geffen said Hillary Clinton is too polarizing, that she should apologize for her 2002 vote in favor of the Iraq war, that her husband, Bill, has a reckless personality, and that the Clintons have a facility for lying. This prompted Clinton communications director Howard Wolfson to fire off a zinger to the media.
"By refusing to disavow the personal attacks from his biggest fundraiser against Senator Clinton and President Clinton, Senator Obama has called into serious question whether he really believes his own rhetoric," Wolfson said. "How can Senator Obama denounce the politics of slash and burn yesterday while his own campaign is espousing the politics of trash today?"
Wolfson called on Obama to apologize for the remarks by Geffen, a former backer of Clinton's husband when he was president. In response, Obama's campaign spokesman said the Illinois senator has nothing to apologize for and that the Clintons had no problem with Geffen when he was raising money for Bill and sleeping in the Lincoln Bedroom of the White House at their invitation. In this first Democratic dustup of the '08 campaign, Hillary's team showed that it is frustrated by Obama's surge but also demonstrated that it is adept at rapid response. Obama and his team proved to be no slouches in that department either.
Obama's problem, however, is that dealing with the seemingly endless cycles of attack and response of the modern presidential campaign will severely test his commitment to a more civil brand of politics.