by Mike Dorning
In a media conference call organized by Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign, three Democratic members of Congress this afternoon offered withering criticism of Barack Obama for a series of “present” votes in the Illinois state legislature that allowed Obama to avoid yes-or-no stands on more than 100 pieces of state legislation.
New York Congressman Joe Crowley called the present votes, examined by the Tribune in May and by the New York Times today, “astonishing.”
Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-N.Y.), charged Obama had “taken the easy way out” and questioned “whether or not this was a strategy to try to have an intentionally vague record going forward.”
“The reason we’re focusing on this,” said Rep. Stephanie Tubbs-Jones (D-Ohio), “is the president of the United States needs to take stands on tough issues….he or she needs to say, yes, this is my position or no, this is my position.”
The Clinton campaign for weeks has pressed the series of present votes in the state legislature in an attempt to portray him as lacking political courage while Obama tries to distinguish himself from Clinton as a candidate of “conviction” rather than “triangulation and poll-driven politics,” a charge critics frequently leveled against Bill Clinton’s presidency.
Obama has defended his present votes in the state legislature, saying that many of them were part of a broader structured political strategy blessed by legislative leaders. In some cases, his campaign noted in a rebuttal posted on the web, the present votes were protests against bills he considered unconstitutional as drafted or followed a practice used in the Illinois state legislature to signal opposition to a bill as drafted but willingness to compromise on the underlying issue.Responding to the Democratic members of Congress criticism today by e-mail, Obama spokesman Ben Labolt said, “These latest politically motivated attacks from the Clinton team, in the middle of their “likability tour,” come at the eleventh hour of a closely contested campaign in which Obama is rising in the polls and picking up key endorsements. Illinois leaders have been clear that voting present was part of a legislative strategy that secured victories for key progressive groups.”
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But, with controversy over the present votes on the influential front page of the New York Times today, the criticism from the Democratic members of Congress improves the chances for a “bounce” in news coverage.
Campaigning in Iowa, Clinton also pressed another line of criticism against Obama, warning voters in rural Grundy Center against electing a president without foreign policy experience and suggesting her leading rivals had shortcomings in the area similar to the incumbent President Bush despised by many partisan Democrats.
“It is tempting any time things seem quieter for a minute on the international front to think that we don’t need a president who is up to speed on foreign affairs and military matters,” Clinton said, according to the Associated Press.
“Well, that’s the kind of logic that got us George Bush in the first place,” she said to laughter from a friendly audience at a high school auditorium. “Experience in foreign affairs is critical for ending the war in Iraq, averting war in Iran, negotiating a Middle East peace and dealing with North Korea.”