- January 8, 2008
Bill Clinton targets media coverage of Obama
Posted: 01:40 PM ET
Watch Bill Clinton's comments Monday night.
(CNN) ¨C On the eve of the New Hampshire primary, former President Bill Clinton criticized the media for not pressing Barack Obama more fully on Iraq, and accused the Illinois senator of shifting his position to reflect changing attitudes on the war.
"It is wrong that Senator Obama got to go through 15 debates trumpeting his superior judgment and how he had been against the war in every year, enumerating the years, and never got asked one time, not once, 'Well, how could you say that when you said in 2004 you didn't know how you would have voted on the resolution? You said in 2004 there was no difference between you and George Bush on the war," Clinton said at a campaign stop in Hanover, New Hampshire.
"And you took that speech you're now running on off your Web site in 2004. And there's no difference in your voting record and Hillary's ever since."
He added, "Give me a break. This whole thing is the biggest fairy tale I've ever seen."
Clinton's wife, New York Sen. Hillary Clinton, is battling Obama for the Democratic presidential nomination.
The former president briefly acknowledged that his wife's senior campaign advisor, Mark Penn, was mistaken to claim that Obama had no bounce out of Iowa after winning the state's caucuses because the poll numbers on the day after were relatively unchanged.
Then he abruptly changed the subject ¡ª suggesting that Obama's campaign had employed underhanded tactics.
"What did you think about the Obama thing calling Hillary the senator from Punjab? Did you like that? Or what about the Obama handout that was covered up, the press never reported on, implying that I was a crook. Scouring me ¡ª scathing criticism over my financial reports. Ken Starr spent $70 million and indicted innocent people to find out that I wouldn't take a nickel to see the cow jump over the moon.
"So you can take a shot at Mark Penn if you want. It wasn't his best day. He was hurt. He felt badly we didn't do better in Iowa," said Clinton. "But the idea that one of these campaigns is positive and the other is negative when I know the reverse is true ¡ª and I have seen it and I have been blistered by it for months ¡ª is a little tough to take. Just because of the sanitizing coverage that's in the media doesn't mean the facts aren't out there."
He added, lightheartedly, "Otherwise, I do not have any strong feelings about that subject."
The former president made the remarks as polls showed his wife trailing Obama in this important first-in-the-nation primary state.
¨C CNN Associate Political Editor Rebecca Sinderbrand
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