* Suzanne Goldenberg and Ewen MacAskill in Washington
* The Guardian,
* Tuesday May 20 2008
The likely Democratic presidential candidate, Barack Obama, yesterday warned Republicans to "lay off" his wife, demonstrating a more forceful style of politics ahead of today's primaries in Oregon and Kentucky. In his second heated response to Republican attacks in days, Obama said he would not tolerate attempts to attack him through his wife, Michelle, calling such efforts "low class".
"They should be careful, because that I find unacceptable, the notion that you start attacking my wife or my family," he told ABC television yesterday. "These folks should lay off my wife."
The state Republican party in Tennessee produced an internet advertisement using footage of Michelle Obama telling a rally in Wisconsin last February that for the first time in her adult life she had felt proud to be an American. The ad mixed footage of the candidate's wife with testimonials from Americans attesting to their love of the country.
The warning from Obama follows his forceful rejection of attempts by President George Bush and the Republican nominee, John McCain, to liken his plan to talk to the Iranian regime to Neville Chamberlain's appeasement of Hitler.
His comments seemed aimed at countering critics who suggested that Obama would be a weak candidate, like Michael Dukakis, who lost the election in 1988. Dukakis is widely believed to have lost because of his seeming lack of emotion in a television debate about whether he would support the death penalty if his wife, Kitty, were raped and murdered.
The clashes between Obama and Republicans have overshadowed the continued primary contest with Hillary Clinton. Obama is expected to use tonight's primary to lay claim to the Democratic nomination with a rally in Iowa, the scene of his first victory last January. He is favoured in Oregon, where on Sunday night he drew a crowd of around 75,000. A Suffolk University poll put him at 45%, with Clinton on 41%. In Kentucky, polls predicted Clinton would beat Obama by 51% to 26%.
In an email to supporters yesterday, Obama's campaign team claimed he was on course to secure most of the delegates elected by voters tonight. He still remains short of the 2,025 needed to secure the nomination, but his team said the night would be "a major milestone". The attempt to lay claim to the nomination brought an angry protest from the Clinton campaign, which said in an email: "Declaring mission accomplished does not make it so."
Meanwhile, McCain went to the Illinois senator's Chicago stronghold yesterday to deliver a speech portraying Obama as favouring higher taxes and higher spending, rehearsing what will be one of his main lines of attack in the November White House campaign.
McCain is also taking steps to try to counter Obama's charge that he is a Washington insider who is too close to lobbyists linked to the business world and foreign governments. Obama claims he has not taken a dime from lobbyists during his presidential run, in contrast with McCain, who has many lobbyists on his team.
McCain last week ordered members of his campaign team to choose between him or their lobbying interests. Four have had to leave, although McCain still employs Charles Black, the head of a leading Washington lobbying firm.
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