CHILLICOTHE, Ohio - Gov. Ted Strickland on Friday sought to allay concerns of gun owners in his state who fear Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama would push for greater restrictions on firearms.
 
“There is probably no governor, I would say, in the United States of America, who has a stronger, better record in the support of the Second Amendment than does Governor Ted Strickland and I’m proud of that,” Strickland told a rally in Chillicothe as he warmed up the crowd ahead of a speech by Obama.
 
Strickland, whose battleground state is a focus of intensive campaigning by Obama and Republican John McCain, said he spoke directly to Obama about the right to bear arms in the Second Amendment.
 
“If you are a sportsman, if you are a gun owner, if you are someone that honors and respects the Second Amendment, you have nothing to fear from Barack Obama,” the Democratic governor said at a rally in the rural southern part of his state.
 
In June, after the Supreme Court struck down a strict gun control law in Washington, Obama said he supports the Second Amendment protection.
 
But he also added that he identifies with some living in inner cities who seek “common sense, effective safety measures” to try reduce gun violence in crime-ravaged communities.
 
In April, Obama’s comments to a closed-door fund-raiser in San Francisco saying small town voters would “cling” to their guns and religion because they were “bitter” over their economic conditions caused a storm of criticism.
 
McCain endeared himself to Americans in favor of the right to bear arms by picking Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, who enjoys hunting and who, according to former Tennessee Republican Sen. Fred Thompson, knows how to “field-dress a moose.”
 
Palin might differ with Strickland on which governor is a bigger champion of the Second Amendment. 

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- Photo credit: Reuters/Jessica Rinaldi (Guns are seen inside a display case at the Cabela’s store in Fort Worth, Texas June 26, 2008)
   

NASHVILLE, Tenn. - Democrat Barack Obama wasn’t quite ready to call it a night after his debate on Tuesday night with Republican John McCain.

Obama stopped by the home Al and Tipper Gore in Belle Meade, just outside of Nashville, where the former vice president and his wife were holding a fundraiser on his behalf.

The soiree raised more than $900,000 for Obama’s campaign coffers.

Gore said he didn’t want to take anything for granted but introduced Obama as the “next president of the United States.”

Obama, who was joined by his wife Michelle, praised Gore’s efforts to fight global warming and said he valued the former vice president’s advice. But he kept his remarks short and passed up the chance to offer some post-debate spin.

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Photo credit: Reuters / Jason Reed 

BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. - Democrat Barack Obama raked in $9 million at fundraisers on Tuesday night flanked by celebrities. But he stopped far short of celebrating.

The White House hopeful kept the tone of his remarks  somber as he talked of the financial crisis that has cast a pall over the economy to an audience that included Pierce Brosnan, Leonardo DiCaprio, Jodi Foster and Jamie Lee Curtis.

“This should be a celebratory evening. We’ve got 48 days to go in a campaign, a campaign that started 19 months ago, at a time when a lot of folks thought we might not get here,” Obama told a reception of 800 people at the swank Beverly Wilshire Hotel.

“I’m not in a celebratory mood,” he said, listing recent events such as the financial turmoil, a deadly train crash in Los Angeles and Gulf Coast hurricanes.

Obama’s Republican rival, John McCain, mocked him for mingling with his “celebrity friends” while middle-class Americans were spending their time worrying about the economy.

At one reception, where donors contributed $2,500 a piece to Obama’s campaign coffers, singer-actress Barbra Streisand gave a rare singing performance.

At an earlier dinner of around 300 people at the Tudor-style Greystone mansion in Beverly Hills, donors paid $28,500 a plate to the Democratic Party and dined on beef filet, asparagus and salad with goat cheese.

Asking them to work hard to help get him elected, Obama said the financial crisis “has reminded people what’s at stake.”

“It’s reminded people that this is not a game. This is not a reality show,” he said and then added, to laughter, “No offense to any of you here.”

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Photo credit: Reuters/ Tobias Schwarz (Barbra Streisand, shown in a 2007 performance in Berlin, sang at an exclusive fundraiser for Obama Tuesday night.)

CHICAGO - Democratic vice presidential candidate Joe Biden, trying to step up his role of attack dog, on Monday labeled Republican John McCain as a “profoundly out of touch” politician using dishonorable tactics to try to win the White House.

In excerpts from a speech he is to give in Michigan, Biden, running mate to presidential hopeful Barack Obama, said both McCain’s policies and his campaign strategies mirror those of the unpopular U.S. President George W. Bush.

“We’ve seen this movie before, folks. But as everyone knows, the sequel is always worse than the original,” Biden will say in the speech he will give in St. Clair Shores, Mich.

“If you’re ready for four more years of George Bush, John McCain is your man. Just as George Herbert Walker Bush was nicknamed ‘Bush 41′ and his son is known as ‘Bush 43,’ John McCain could easily become known as ‘Bush 44,’” Biden plans to say.

Opinion polls show a dead-even race between Obama and McCain with less than two months to go before the Nov. 4 election.

Helped by his pick of Sarah Palin as his No. 2, McCain erased the lead that Obama held for most of the summer, leaving many Democrats nervous and impatient for Obama to begin hitting back at attacks they contend are straight out of the playbook of former Bush adviser Karl Rove.

In lambasting McCain, Biden is stepping into the traditional role for a vice presidential candidate of attack dog. He has been critical of McCain in previous speeches but Monday’s speech marked an escalation of the tone. Part of Biden’s difficulty in playing the attack-dog role effectively is that he is not getting nearly the media spotlight that Palin, a new face on the national political scene, is receiving.

Recalling the many years he has been a Senate colleague of McCain, an Arizona senator, Biden accused McCain of selling out his principles to win the election.

“The campaign a person runs says everything about the way they’ll govern. John McCain has decided to bet the house on the politics perfected by Karl Rove,” Biden says in the speech.

McCain campaign spokesman Ben Porritt dismissed Biden’s comments as those of a “long-time Washington insider, entrenched in the status quo.”

“Regardless of their rhetoric, Barack Obama and his running mate can’t distance themselves from their records which gives voters zero confidence that they can deliver change when we need it the most,” Porritt said.

The Obama campaign also released a new ad saying McCain was taking “the low road” in some of his campaign’s ads and attacks on the Democratic candidate, citing commentary in newspapers such as the Washington Post and Chicago Tribune that criticized the McCain ads.  

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- Photo credit: Reuters/Jim Young (Biden during a campaign stop in Ohio in late August.)

MANCHESTER, N.H. - As Hurricane Gustav threatened to wreak havoc on the Gulf Coast two weeks ago, Democrat Barack Obama made a point of toning down his campaign rhetoric during a swing through the Midwest, saying it was not a time for politics.

The White House hopeful and his Republican opponent John McCain also took a day off from battling each other on Thursday to observe the anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks in a solemn ceremony at Ground Zero in New York City.

But Obama, who has faced complaints from some supporters that he is not fighting back hard enough against McCain’s attacks, was undeterred in his determination on Saturday to keep up a more aggressive tone to his campaigning as Hurricane Ike raked Texas.

Obama used the first several minutes of his rally speech here to express sympathy for people in Texas whose lives have been “upended as a consequence of Hurricane Ike.”

Then he transitioned back to the campaign by saying that Americans across the country are facing a “quiet storm” because of the failed policies of the Bush administration.

He lambasted McCain as someone offering more of the same, saying he was “out of touch” while latching onto the Democrat’s message of change.

“You’ve got John McCain, my opponent in this election, who has been standing up since his convention suggesting that somehow he and his running mate are going to be the original mavericks and are going to shake things up in Washington,” Obama told the outdoor rally of about 7,000 people.

That prompted McCain spokesman Tucker Bounds to point out that Obama had canceled plans to appear on Saturday Night Live this weekend because of Hurricane Ike but did not set politics aside. Obama’s running mate, Joe Biden, scrapped plans to attend the Manchester rally with Obama in light of the storm.

“Today’s attacks mark a new low from Barack Obama,” Bounds said, adding that “it says a lot about Barack Obama’s judgment.”

Obama spokesman Bill Burton volleyed back with a scathing criticism of McCain as someone who is “cynically running the sleaziest and least honorable campaign in modern presidential campaign history.”

The statement was one of blizzard of e-mails the Obama campaign sent out during the day bashing McCain and his running mate, Sarah Palin.  One such e-mail was a lengthy memo cataloguing what it characterized as the McCain campaign’s “lies and spin”.

McCain was off the campaign trail for the day while Palin held a rally in Alaska before heading to campaign in the lower 48 states.

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- Photo credit: Reuters/ Neal Hamberg (Obama at a New Hampshire rally.)

MANCHESTER, N.H. - Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama has canceled plans to appear on the season premiere of Saturday Night Live after his campaign decided this weekend was not a time for humor in light of the expected devastation from Hurricane Ike.

In what may be the worst storm to hit Texas in nearly 50 years, the hurricane was packing high winds and U.S. officials warned storm waves could cause a catastrophe along the state’s coastline.

“In light of the unfolding crisis in Texas, Sen. Obama has decided it is no longer appropriate to appear on Saturday Night Live tomorrow evening,” said Obama spokeswoman Jen Psaki.

Obama has been campaigning in the battleground state of New Hampshire and is to speak at a rally in Manchester on Saturday morning. Instead of flying to New York afterwards to appear on the show, Obama will fly back to his home in Chicago.

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- Photo credit: NOAA handout

CONCORD, N.H. - Barack Obama accused Republicans on Friday of trying to shift the focus of the presidential debate away from serious issues such as the economy and toward frivolous subjects like lipstick, Britney Spears and Paris Hilton.

Taking on a feistier tone, the Democratic presidential hopeful sought to show his supporters he wants to fight back aggressively against escalating attacks by his rival John McCain.

Democrats have become concerned about the momentum gained by McCain and his new running mate as polls have shown McCain has pulled even or slightly ahead of Obama, erasing the lead the Democratic presidential nominee held throughout the summer.

“You’ve seen the other side not want to spend any time talking about the issues,” Obama said. “I mean, what have they been talking about? They’ve been talking about lipstick. They’ve been talking about pigs. They’ve been talking about Britney. They’ve been talking about Paris.”

“These are serious times and it requires a serious debate,” he said. Obama was referring to a blitz of ads McCain has run, including one that likened him to celebrities such as Britney Spears and Paris Hilton.

In another ad, McCain accused Obama of trying to smear Palin, an Alaska governor and self-described “hockey mom,”  when he likened the Republican’s plans for government reform to putting “lipstick on a pig.”

The McCain campaign has suggested that Obama was making reference to Palin’s joke that the only difference between a hockey mom and a pit bull was lipstick but Obama’s campaign denies his comment had anything to do with Palin.

Some of Obama’s backers worry that Obama won’t push back hard enough against the kind of “Swift Boat” attacks used against Democrat John Kerry in his failed 2004 White House bid.

But Obama has been emphasizing he is not going to shrink from the fight against tactics he compares to those of President George W. Bush’s strategist, Karl Rove.

“Here’s what I can guarantee you: We are going to be hitting back hard. We have been hitting back hard. We have been hitting back hard but we’re hitting back on the issues that matter to families,” Obama said earlier in the day at an event in Dover, N.H.

Obama was responding to a question at a town-hall style event from 39-year-old Glenn Grasso, who pressed the Democratic candidate on how he would respond to Republican “attack ads and the smear campaigns.” 

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- Photo credit: Reuters/Mike Segar (Obama at forum on national service in New York on Sept. 11). ABC handout (McCain appearance on The View).

NEW YORK - Barack Obama  and Bill Clinton talked over lunch on Thursday about the economy and world affairs in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks and what the former president can do to help the Democratic nominee defeat Republican John McCain in the Nov. 4 election.

In a joint statement, the two men said they had a “great conversation” during their meeting, which came on the seventh anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

“They discussed the campaign briefly but mostly talked about how the world has changed since September 11, 2001,” the statement said. “They also spoke about what the next president can do to help make the economy work for all Americans, as it did under President Clinton, and ensure safety and prosperity far beyond the coming the election.”

The lunch at Clinton’s office in New York’s Harlem neighborhood was the first lengthy meeting between the two since Obama emerged as the victor in his drawn-out Democratic primary battle against Clinton’s wife, Hillary. Bill Clinton has been widely reported to have nursed hard feelings about his wife’s loss, although he strongly endorsed Obama at the Democratic convention in Denver and plans to campaign for him in the coming weeks.

“We’re putting him to work,” Obama joked to reporters as he stood with the former president in an office reception area lined with books, photographs and memorabilia.

“I’ve agreed to do a substantial number of things, whatever I’m asked to do,” Clinton said of his plans for campaigning on Obama’s behalf.

Asked for his predictions about the close White House race between Obama and McCain, Clinton said he though Obama would win “pretty handily.”

To which Obama replied: “There you go. You can take it from the president of the United States. He knows a little something about politics.”

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Photo credit: Reuters/ Mike Segar - Democratic presidential candidate Senator Barack Obama and former U.S. President Bill Clinton appear together outside Clinton’s Harlem New York office, following a lunch meeting Sept. 11.

NEW YORK - Former President Bill Clinton, who will be meeting Barack Obama for lunch on Thursday, also plans to hit the campaign trail for the Democratic presidential nominee.

Discussing his planned meeting with Clinton on “The Late Show with David Letterman,” Obama praised the former president’s political skills and drew parallels between his own message of change in the current campaign and the one Clinton ran on when he beat then-President George H.W. Bush in 1992.

“You had an economy that wasn’t working for people, you had a party that had been in power that didn’t seem particularly concerned that it wasn’t working for people, but you know, he was new,” Obama said. “He was young and people were still trying to figure out whether or not the guy was up to the job.”

But Obama added, to applause, that there was “nobody smarter in politics” than Bill Clinton.

The lunch in New York is the first lengthy meeting between Obama and the former president since the Illinois senator emerged as the winner in the long Democratic primary fight between Obama and Clinton’s wife, Hillary Clinton.

Several news reports have suggested Bill Clinton has been slower than his wife to move beyond the hard feelings stirred up during the primary battle, though the Obama camp was pleased by the former president’s hearty endorsement of Obama at the Democratic convention in Denver last month.

Obama also plans to commemorate the anniversary of the 9/11 attacks and will also visit Ground Zero in a rare joint appearance with Republican presidential nominee John McCain.

Obama spokeswoman Jen Psaki said both the luncheon and the Ground Zero visit were in keeping with a unity theme for the day.

“Tomorrow is a day for unity, not politics,” she said.

Obama and McCain are locked in a close race but recently the Republican candidate has been moving up in the polls, helped by the enthusiam within his party for his new running mate, Sarah Palin.

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Photo credit: Reuters/Jim Young - Barack Obama with Hillary Clinton and former President Bill Clinton at a memorial service for Rep. Stephanie Tubbs Jones in Cleveland, Ohio on Aug. 30.

MONROE, Mich. - Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama said on Monday the pregnancy of Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin’s daughter was not relevant to the campaign and reporters should back off of it.

Obama also said he was offended by a suggestion from an unidentified McCain aide that his campaign might have had a hand in spreading rumors about Palin and her family.
 
“People’s families are off-limits and people’s children are especially off-limits,” Obama told reporters following a campaign event in Monroe, Michigan. “This shouldn’t be part of our politics. It has no relevance to Gov. Palin’s performance as a governor or potential performance as a vice president. So I would strongly urge people to back off these kinds of stories,” he added.

There was no evidence Obama’s campaign had any role in stoking a rumor that Bristol Palin was actually the mother of Palin’s four-month-old. Reporters traveling with the campaign had been fascinated by the talk for days. Obama’s press aides even told reporters the rumors seemed far-fetched and they would have nothing to say about them.
 
Palin has been the subject of a rumor mill among liberal bloggers who have speculated that Palin faked her own pregnancy in order to cover up for her 17-year-old daughter, Bristol. These bloggers speculated that Sarah Palin’s fifth child, born in April with Down’s syndrome, was actually Bristol Palin’s child and that Sarah Palin was the grandmother. To rebut those rumors, Palin and her husband released a statement, first reported by Reuters, saying that Bristol was five months pregnant.
 
A senior McCain campaign aide was quoted in the Reuters story as suggesting that Obama’s campaign was linked to the bloggers who were spreading the rumors.
 
“I am offended by that statement,” Obama said when asked about it by a reporter. “There is no evidence at all that any of this involved us. Our people were not involved in any way in this and they will not be,” he added. “And if I ever thought there was somebody in my campaign that was involved in something like that, they’d be fired.” 

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 Photo credit: Reuters/Matt Sullivan