Obama, McCain trade jabs on flip-flopping
Words heat up over who's soft on the issues
In the escalating war over who is the bigger flip-flopper, Senator John McCain's campaign used his speech yesterday in Canada to accuse Senator Barack Obama of double talk on the North American Free Trade Agreement.
Obama's campaign, in turn, jumped on a private meeting that McCain had with Hispanic leaders to call him two-faced on comprehensive immigration reform.
McCain assured more than 150 Latino leaders in Chicago on Thursday night that if elected president, he would push through Congress legislation to overhaul federal immigration laws, several of those in attendance said.
Obama communications director Robert Gibbs noted that during the GOP primaries, McCain said he would no longer vote for the comprehensive reform bill he championed in Congress last year that included a path to citizenship. Under withering attacks from primary foes who accused him of favoring amnesty for illegal immigrants, McCain said he would not pursue the reform bill until the borders were secure.
"He's one John McCain in front of white Republicans. And he's a different John McCain in front of Hispanics," said one of those at the meeting, Rosanna Pulido, who heads the Illinois Minuteman Project, which advocates for restrictive immigration laws.
Gibbs took up that theme, telling reporters that McCain is having a "tortured debate" with himself on that issue, as well as on offshore oil drilling. McCain switched positions this week to support lifting the federal ban on offshore exploration. Obama said yesterday the proposal "makes absolutely no sense at all" because it would not bring Americans any appreciable savings in gasoline prices until 2030.
Obama is seeking more support from Hispanics, who mostly backed rival Hillary Clinton during the Democratic primaries. He has also supported sweeping reform, including a path to citizenship for some illegal immigrants.
On trade, however, Obama was on the defensive. Trying to outdo Clinton in appealing to union voters, Obama had said he would renegotiate NAFTA so that it was more favorable to US workers.
But McCain's camp points to an interview in the upcoming issue of Fortune magazine in which Obama said he would not unilaterally renegotiate NAFTA. He is now clarifying that he would sit down with trade partners and talk about possible adjustments.
McCain, in a statement, accused Obama of bashing NAFTA "to further his cynical political purposes in the primary campaign," and now reinventing his position "to sound less irresponsible."
In his speech to the Economic Club of Canada in Toronto yesterday, McCain vowed that if he becomes president, "have no doubt that America will honor its international commitments - and we will expect the same of others."
"Since NAFTA was concluded, it has contributed to strong job growth and flourishing trade. Since the agreement was signed, the United States has added 25 million jobs and Canada more than 4 million," McCain said.
While he declined to directly criticize Obama while on foreign soil, McCain added in an unmistakable reference to his opponent, "Demanding unilateral changes and threatening to abrogate an agreement that has increased trade and prosperity is nothing more than retreating behind protectionist walls."
In response, the Obama campaign organized a conference call with Governors Jennifer Granholm of Michigan and Ted Strickland of Ohio, and Senator Sherrod Brown of Ohio, who all asserted that a McCain presidency would continue the Bush administration's failed trade policies.
"Instead of delivering a speech from Ottawa, Canada, Senator McCain should visit Ottawa, Ohio, where the Phillips plant closed," Brown said in a statement issued by the AFL-CIO. "We need trade policies that create new jobs at home, not ship them to Mexico."
The Democratic governors were among 16 who met with Obama yesterday in Chicago to discuss the faltering economy. They told him how people in their states are suffering, from high energy and food costs, loss of manufacturing jobs, and the housing slump. "There is a deep recession and frankly I believe it's gaining momentum," said New Jersey's governor, Jon Corzine.
Obama pledged to work with them on policies that would help, including a plan to spend billions to build roads, bridges, and other infrastructure projects that could create jobs and improve transportation routes. 