SENATOR CLINTON: REV. WRIGHT “WOULD NOT HAVE BEEN MY PASTOR”

At a news conference yesterday, Senator Clinton said she would not have been part of the flock of Senator Obama’s longtime minister, the Reverend Jeremiah Wright Jr.

“I think, given all we have heard and seen, he would not have been my pastor,” Mrs. Clinton told reporters in Greensburg, Pa. “You know, we don’t have a choice when it comes to our relatives. We have a choice when it comes to our pastors and the churches we attend. Everyone will have to decide these matters for themselves. They are obviously very personal matters. But I was asked what I would do if he were my pastor. And I said I think the choice would be clear for me.” When Rev. Wright’s anti-American comments became a cable television staple this month, Mrs. Clinton declined to comment on them. She said she did so at yesterday’s news conference only because during an editorial meeting at the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, she was asked whether she would have followed a minister who made similar remarks.

Mr. Obama’s campaign said Mrs. Clinton’s new willingness to address the subject was a transparent attempt to turn news attention away from her incorrect claim to have been under sniper fire on a trip to Bosnia in 1996.

“It’s disappointing to see Hillary Clinton’s campaign sink to this low,” an Obama spokesman, William Burton, said.

GOP URGES OBAMA TO DROP EX-GENERAL OVER ISRAEL VIEWS

A Republican group is urging Senator Obama to dump one of his military advisers, Merrill McPeak, because of his suggestion several years ago that the political clout of Jewish Americans was blocking peace in the Middle East.

“By choosing to have a military advisor and national campaign co-chairman like General McPeak, serious questions and doubts are once again being raised about Senator Obama’s positions and judgment on Middle East issues,” the executive director of the Republican Jewish Coalition, Matthew Brooks, said in a statement yesterday. He pointed to a 2003 interview in which the Oregonian newspaper asked Mr. McPeak what was preventing America from brokering a deal. “New York City. Miami. We have a large vote — vote, here in favor of Israel. And no politician wants to run against it,” the former general said. He also said those political concerns made it untenable for American officials to pressure the Israelis to stop settlement activity in the West Bank. “Neither Senator Clinton nor Senator Obama agrees with every position their advisers take, and in this case Senator Obama disagrees with General McPeak’s comments,” a spokesman for Mr. Obama, Thomas Vietor, said in response to a query from The New York Sun. He did not address the call to remove Mr. McPeak, but the spokesman said Mr. Obama’s “commitment to Israel is clear to anyone who has reviewed his voting record, read his speeches, or looked at his policy papers.”

OBAMA RELEASES TAX RETURNS, CALLS ON CLINTON TO MATCH

Senator Obama posted tax returns between 2000 and 2006 on the Web yesterday and urged Senator Clinton to do the same. The previously released 2006 return from Mr. Obama and his wife, Michelle showed $1 million in income, about half of it from sales of his book “The Audacity of Hope.” Early in the decade, the Obamas gave less than 1% of their income to charity. In 2002, they gave $1,050 while declaring income of $259,394. In 2005, as their income soared to almost $1.7 million, they boosted their donations to $77,315. A spokesman for Mr. Obama told Bloomberg News that the couple gave what they could while paying back student loans and raising their children. In 2000 through 2004, the Obamas checked boxes to direct $3 each to the Presidential Election Campaign Matching Fund. They did not make that election in 2005 and 2006. There was no immediate explanation from the campaign.

NANCY REAGAN ENDORSES MCCAIN

President Reagan’s widow, Nancy, endorsed Senator McCain yesterday. “My husband and I first came to know him as a returning Vietnam War POW and were impressed by the courage he had shown through his terrible ordeal,” Mrs. Reagan said in a statement. “I believe John’s record and experience have prepared him well to be our next president.”