Democrats spar over Mich.

John McCain, meeting for the first time with Prime Minister Gordon Brown of Britain yesterday, refrained from calling publicly for Britain to slow the pace of its troop withdrawal from southern Iraq. (Peter Macdiarmid/Getty Images)

Barack Obama's campaign said yesterday that evenly splitting Michigan's delegates with rival Hillary Clinton would be a fair way to distribute them, now that the chances of a do-over primary are essentially dead.

The Clinton campaign immediately rejected the idea, and she called on Obama again to agree on a way to count the Michigan delegates, as well as those from Florida. "I do not see how two of our largest and most significant states can be disenfranchised and left out of the process of picking our nominee without raising serious questions about the legitimacy of that nominee," she said while campaigning in Indiana.

The Michigan Senate adjourned yesterday without taking up a bill for a June 3 repeat primary. Governor Jennifer Granholm, who has endorsed Clinton, said in a statement that she was deeply disappointed. "We will turn our attention to other options," she said. "There is no road to the White House that does not go through Michigan"

Clinton won Michigan's primary in January, but it didn't count toward the presidential nomination because the state violated Democratic National Committee rules by holding the contest before Feb. 5. Obama took his name off the ballot.

ASSOCIATED PRESS

Obama blames Iraq war for rising oil prices, debt
President Bush on Wednesday sought to link success in the five-year-old war in Iraq to economic issues, warning of dire consequences if the United States withdraws too soon and Al Qaeda wrests control of Iraq's oil fields.

Yesterday, Barack Obama made a similar connection - but to make a different point. The war he wants to end has already taken a toll on the US economy and burdened families, he said.

"When you're spending over $50 to fill up your car because the price of oil is four times what it was before Iraq, you're paying a price for this war," Obama told a crowd in Charleston, W. Va., as he sought to tie the war to the slumping economy in the working-class state. When Iraq is costing each household about $100 a month, you're paying a price for this war."

GLOBE STAFF

AND ASSOCIATED PRESS

Ferraro challenges comparison to ex-pastor
Geraldine Ferraro is none too pleased with Barack Obama. Again.

The 1984 vice presidential nominee said Obama's campaign unfairly stoked the controversy - and all but accused her of racism - over her remarks earlier this month about Obama being "lucky" to be black because it helped push him to the front of the Democratic presidential race.

Now, she has told the same local newspaper in California where that interview was published that she objects to the comparison Obama drew in his much-discussed speech on race between her and his former pastor, whose sermons caused an uproar.

In his Tuesday address, Obama said: "We can dismiss Reverend [Jeremiah] Wright as a crank or a demagogue, just as some have dismissed Geraldine Ferraro, in the aftermath of her recent statements, as harboring some deep-seated bias."

In a story published yesterday in the Daily Breeze of Torrance, Calif., she said: "To equate what I said with what this racist bigot has said from the pulpit is unbelievable. He gave a very good speech on race relations, but he did not address the fact that this man is up there spewing hatred."

Ferraro, a Hillary Clinton supporter, also said that Obama's 20-year association with Wright raises questions about his judgment.

She also faulted Obama for linking his grandmother with Wright when he said he could not "disown" either and described her as "a woman who loves me as much as she loves anything in this world, but a woman who once confessed her fear of black men who passed her by on the street, and who on more than one occasion has uttered racial or ethnic stereotypes that made me cringe."

Retorted Ferraro: "I could not believe that. That's my mother's generation."

FOON RHEE

McCain reports taking in $11 million in February
John McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee, reported last night that he raised nearly $11.6 million in February and had $8 million in cash at month's end.

McCain, who numerically clinched the nomination after the March 4 primaries, still owes more than $4 million in loans, according to his campaign's report to the Federal Election Commission. For the entire campaign, the Arizona senator reported bringing in nearly $60 million and spending about $48 million.

Those figures are far less than both Democratic contenders. Neither Barack Obama nor Hillary Clinton had filed their reports last night, but Obama has said he raised $55 million last month, while Clinton has put her total at $35 million. That gap that has been fueling a feud between McCain and Obama over possible public financing for the general election.

McCain filed paperwork with the FEC earlier this month to create a public financing account, though his campaign stressed today that he hasn't decided whether to accept public money. Candidates who do so get $million for the general election, but agree not to raise private money.

FOON RHEE