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 News from Around the Americas | February 2008 
MoveOn and California SEIU Endorse Obama
 Associated Press
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| | Barack Obama picked up the endorsement of the anti-war group, MoveOn, and said Democratic presidential rival Hillary Rodham Clinton still has not adequately explained her vote to go into Iraq. | | |
Los Angeles - Barack Obama picked up the endorsement of a leading anti-war group Friday and said Democratic presidential rival Hillary Rodham Clinton still has not adequately explained her vote to go into Iraq.
Obama told reporters in a news conference that, even though Clinton explains how she would like to end the war, her explanation for her vote leading into the war is disingenuous. He said his opposition against the war from the start will make him the stronger rival to Republican front-runner and war backer John McCain in the general election.
Obama's long-standing opposition to the war helped him pick up the backing of MoveOn.org, a liberal network which counts 3.2 million members and decided to back him by a vote of 70% to 30% for Clinton. The group said Friday that it has 1.7 million members in the 22 states scheduled to vote in the race Tuesday, and it would immediately begin a campaign to get them behind Obama.
Obama also picked up the support of a large union in California which had been backing rival John Edwards, who dropped out of the race this week.
MoveOn.org executive director Eli Pariser said the country needs a president to end the war, provide universal health care, address climate change, restore America's standing in the world and "change business as usual in Washington." In his statement, Pariser thanked all the other candidates who ran in the Democratic primary for their contributions to the race.
Obama criticized Clinton's answer during a debate Thursday night when she was asked why she voted against a 2003 amendment offered by Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich. The amendment would have given weapons inspectors more time in Iraq and required President Bush to first obtain U.N. approval before using force. Clinton argued that a vote for the Levin amendment would have subordinated U.S. authority in Iraq to the U.N. Security Council and called it a troublesome precedent.
She reiterated her explanation of the 2002 vote to give President Bush authority to use military force to oust Saddam Hussein. But she added, "If I had known then what I know now, I never would have given President Bush the authority. It was a sincere vote based on my assessment at the time and what I believed he would do with the authority he was given. He abused that authority; he misused that authority."
She declined to say the vote was a mistake. Obama criticized her explanation in his news conference, the third he's held this week leading into the Super Tuesday contests. Clinton holds a lead in the polling in most of those states.
"I think there continues to be a suggestion that it was not a vote for war, and I thought that her explanation with respect to the Levin amendment was inaccurate," Obama said. "Anyone who looks at the Levin amendment knows that we were not ceding sovereignty in some fashion to the United Nations."
In Sacramento, one of California's largest unions, the Service Employees International Union, decided to throw its support to Obama, spokeswoman Jeanine Meyer Rodriguez told the Associated Press.
The president of the state council, Annelle Grajeda, was to formally announce the endorsement in a statement later Friday.
The 650,000-member union's backing could help Obama cut into Clinton's lead in California polls of Democratic base voters, many of whom are union members. The SEIU includes city, county and state workers, as well as in-home support and health care workers.
Union officials will urge their members to vote for Obama but do not plan to do a wider get-out-the-vote effort.
Obama Picks Up Key Edwards Supporter
Maria L. La Ganga & Michael Muskal - Los Angeles Times
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Sen. Barack Obama today picked up the support of a key California union that had backed one of his failed opponents for the Democratic presidential nomination.
The state council of the Service Employees International Union has decided to back Obama after its first choice, former Sen. John Edwards dropped out this week, spokeswoman Jeanine Meyer Rodriguez said in a telephone interview.
"Basically we think that there are really good candidates in this election, and a lot of good energy," she said of Obama and his principal rival New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, who was campaigning today in California.
"We believe that Obama best advances our vision for a new America, united in hope," Rodriguez said in explaining why the union decided to back the Illinois senator. Annelle Grajeda, president of the group, formally announced the decision this morning.
The 650,000-member state union represents employees including nurses, janitors and home care workers. It is especially strong in the Latino community, a key voting bloc in Tuesday's primary in California and some 20 other contests across the nation.
The union's decision to go with Obama is also important as part of the campaign's efforts to woo former supporters of Edwards, who dropped out of the presidential sweepstakes after running poorly in the early primaries and caucuses. Edwards keyed his effort on a strong economic campaign and helping to poor and unionized.
At a Los Angeles news conference, Obama said that he has specifically asked Edwards for his endorsement, although "we haven't had specific conversations about an Obama administration.... He and I share a fundamental view that it is not enough to just change political parties."
The Obama campaign is courting Edwards' supporters heavily.
In a statement, the campaign announced that "elected officials including a former congressman from Georgia and state legislative leaders in Arizona, New Jersey, North Dakota and Virginia announced their decision to support Obama after previously playing a leading role in the Edwards campaign."
At his news conference, which focused mainly on economic issues, Obama said he thought that the Thursday night debate underscored the major differences between himself and Sen. Clinton - Iraq, health care and lobbyists.
"The problem with the war in Iraq was a problem of conception. If we go in there suggesting it was just not managed well by George Bush, then Sen. McCain will be able to come back and argue that ... we are now getting it right," Obama said of the leading GOP candidate, Arizona Sen. John McCain.
"I totally dispute that," Obama continued. "It is easier for me to dispute," he said, given his long-standing statements that the war was a strategic error.
Obama today also was endorsed by MoveOn.org, a liberal social network on the Web that claims 3.2 million members. Members backed Obama by a ratio of better than 2-to-1, the group said in a statement. |
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