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July 5, 2008 5:32:21 PM CDT

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GOP Embraces Clinton as Obama Surges

Posted Apr 4, 08 4:05 PM CDT in Politics    Most Covered

(Newser) – As Barack Obama emerges as Democratic front-runner, Republicans appear to be recalibrating their compasses:

  • Disparaging Obama and praising Hillary Clinton is an inevitable response to Obama's growing odds of winning, Jonathan Chait writes in the New Republic: Karl Rove & Co. “discredit” Obama by defining his “supporters out of the mainstream”—as academics and elites—and crediting his rival with populism just to show  he lacks it.
 

  • In the Weekly Standard, Dean Barnett gives the candidate some seemingly cynical advice: name John Kerry his running mate. The righty musters a good case for a VP pick he clearly disrespects: Obama needs a veteran with a full résumé—and Kerry is “haughty and dour ... sort of bastard cousins to seriousness.”
  • Meanwhile, a decidedly lefty Kate Sheppard writes in the American Prospect that Obama is pulling his weight on a blue-collar Pennsylvania tour, “fine-tuning his populism in the process.” The candidate’s lucky to have the “exercise”: He’ll need to win these swing voters in November.
 

Sources: New Republic, American Prospect, Weekly Standard

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Democratic presidential hopeful Sen. Barack Obama D-Ill. talks over the counter at Claudio Speciality Foods.   (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
Democratic presidential hopeful Sen. Barack Obama.   (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
Democratic presidential hopeful, Sen. Barack Obama.   (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
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Barack Obama  • Hillary Clinton  • Pennsylvania primary  • John Kerry  • blue-collar vote  • swing voters


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Related Threads: Obama 2008, Clinton 2008, Election 2008, Clinton-Obama Tussle, A House Divided

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