By Mike Manzoni
Early this week, Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.) called Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) out for a game of bowling in an analogy that she used to bring attention to his abbreviated résumé.
This challenge came from Clinton at a Pennsylvania conference on Tuesday, just a few weeks after another attack on Obama called the “3 a.m.” ad, which suggested that Clinton was better equipped to answer international issues and has garnered attention from both the media and citizens alike.
And when this game is over, the American people will know they’ll have a president who’s ready to bowl on day one. We don’t have a moment to spare because it’s already April Fool’s Day.”
On Wednesday afternoon, she issued another ad using the same “3 a.m.” theme, but this time focusing on the economy and attacked Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), accusing him of saying that “the government shouldn’t take any real action on the housing crisis,” and adding that “he’d let the phone keep ringing,” should an overnight economic crisis arise.
Obama had played in a real bowling match in Altoona, Pa. and bowled a 37. He was later quoted by The Associated Press as saying, “I was terrible…. My economic plan is better than my bowling.”
Obama received several endorsements in the past week, including Sen. Bob Casey (D-Pa.), who said he would remain neutral through his state’s primary. Former Sept. 11 Commission member Lee Hamilton, a former Democratic congressman from Indiana, which holds its primary on May 6, endorsed Obama on Tuesday.
Polls indicate a lead for Clinton in Pennsylvania, and a RealClearPolitics.com average of polls in North Carolina give Obama a double-digit lead there.
While the two Democratic rivals were trading verbal jabs across the nation, a group of University students were in the nation’s capital for an annual trip organized by the political science department.
Briefed at the Democratic National Committee by Capitol Hill before returning to the University on Tuesday, the students-mostly political science majors and a few journalism majors-spoke with Parag Mehta, the committee’s director of training.
“This is a cycle we haven’t really seen since 1952,” Mehta said, referring to this year’s Democratic presidential election which is the first contest since the early 1950s when neither an incumbent president nor vice president was in the race at this time of the year.
The visit at the committee’s headquarters was one of the last stops on an itinerary which included visits to conservative think tanks, as well as stops at various media outlets such as XM Satellite Radio and the National Journal.
“These are two of the best qualified candidates we’ve ever seen,” Mehta said, emphasizing the DNC’s neutrality in the race, adding that they are “going to be the government for all the people.”
Mehta assured students and professors that he believes a Democrat will ultimately win, but he acknowledged the divisive nature of his party’s campaign.
“We’re going to win, but we don’t take it for granted,” he said, although he did acknowledge that “Democrats are divided.”
Questioned about the votes of young people and how much it means to Democrats, Mehta said, “We don’t win elections without the youth vote.”
Mehta said, according to his own findings, young people are becoming more involved and are paying better attention to issues affecting the country.
As students passed by the Pentagon in Arlington, Va. before heading back to New York, the campaign they had spent some time learning about was very much alive just a few hundred miles northeast.