Obama Response Hits McCain ‘Washington Celebrity’

This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.

The New York Sun

Senator Obama has a new retort to Senator McCain over his derisive claims that the Illinois senator is a “celebrity”: So are you. The Obama campaign yesterday released a television ad that labels the presumptive Republican nominee “Washington’s biggest celebrity.” The 30-second spot features images of Mr. McCain’s many appearances with David Letterman and Jay Leno and on “Saturday Night Live.” It also shows him repeatedly embracing President Bush, to whom the Democrats have tried to link Mr. McCain for months. “Lurching to the right, then to the left, the old Washington dance, whatever it takes,” a narrator says in the ad, which the campaign said would run on national cable television. “A Washington celebrity playing the same old Washington games.” The ad comes two weeks after the McCain campaign launched a spot labeling Mr. Obama a celebrity and featuring images of Britney Spears and Paris Hilton.

DEMOCRATS ANNOUNCE CONVENTION SPEAKERS, THEMES

Senator Obama’s vice presidential nominee will address the Democratic National Convention on a night dedicated to veterans’ issues and foreign policy, suggesting that the eventual choice may be someone with a military background or expertise in international affairs. The Democratic convention committee yesterday announced an initial schedule of speakers and nightly themes for the four-day event set to begin in two weeks in Denver. Mr. Obama’s wife, Michelle, will headline the first night, and his vanquished rival, Senator Clinton, will keynote the second evening. The third and forth night will feature the vice presidential pick and Mr. Obama, respectively. A senior Obama adviser, Anita Dunn, cautioned reporters not to read any clues into the foreign policy theme of the convention’s third night, however. President Clinton is reportedly also scheduled to speak that night, but Ms. Dunn refused to confirm his appearance in a conference call yesterday.

REPORT: PENN ADVISED CLINTON TO QUESTION OBAMA’S ROOTS

Senator Clinton’s former chief strategist, Mark Penn, advised her to raise implicit questions about Senator Obama’s patriotism by emphasizing her own American roots, according to campaign memos published in a new account by the Atlantic Monthly. Mr. Penn told Mrs. Clinton and her top advisers that Mr. Obama’s childhood in Indonesia and Hawaii “exposes a very strong weakness” in his background, according to one memo. “His roots to basic American values and culture are at best limited,” Mr. Penn wrote. “I cannot imagine America electing a president during a time of war who is not at his center fundamentally American in his thinking and in his values.” Mrs. Clinton chose not to go down that road, although those questions have been raised by some conservative opponents of Mr. Obama. Mr. Penn drew criticism for his role in Mrs. Clinton’s primary loss, and the lengthy Atlantic article, published online last night, details much of the infighting among advisers in the Clinton campaign.

MCCAIN TO APPEAR IN NEW JERSEY TODAY

Senator McCain won’t eclipse the enormous fund-raising advantage his Democratic rival has built in New Jersey, but he is hoping to narrow the gap a little when he and his wife visit the Garden State today. The presumptive Republican nominee plans to attend a private fund-raiser in Teaneck while Cindy McCain attends a money-raising luncheon and makes campaign stops in Republican-friendly Monmouth. Today marks Mr. McCain’s sixth visit to New Jersey since declaring his candidacy for the Republican nomination. “We believe very deeply that New Jersey and New York are in play for Senator McCain,” Senator Bill Baroni, who chairs Mr. McCain’s New Jersey campaign, said. “We are here, we are competing.”

OBAMA PLANS POLICY BOOK

Senator Obama, with the help of his campaign staff, has another side to share with readers: policy wonk. “Change We Can Believe In: Barack Obama’s Plan to Renew America’s Promise” is coming out September 9 as a paperback with an announced first printing of 300,000 copies and a list price of $13.95. The book will include a foreword by Mr. Obama and feature sections — written by members of Obama for America, his presidential campaign — on such issues as health care, energy, and national security. “Change We Can Believe In” also compiles some of his better-known speeches, including his celebrated talk on race and his recent address in Berlin.


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