Haha.. Clinton says Obama should unilaterally disarm, while she admittedly will not commit to public financing. Is this a real story? Her camp just repeating the McCain charge, who is scared to death of Obama's contributor base.

"its unfortunate to see the Obama campaign using what are clearly right-wing talking points to attack a Democratic candidate."

- Howard Wolfson

So what's the surprise? If Clinton sees a rock lying around (or can imagine one), she's going to throw it at Obama.

What I find amazing about all this is that HE IS NOT YET THE NOMINEE. Surely the superstitious McCain understands that Obama doesn't want to have these conversations while he's still fighting, quite hard, to get the nomination. And surely HRC would be better off saying "well, it doesn't reflect well on him but it's a moot point, since he's not going to be in a position where he needs to decide". I swear they are both doing the best they can to make Obama look good, like the 'grown up' in the room.

Obama DID NOT say he WOULD take public financing. He said he would SEEK an agreement with the Republican candidate to abide by the same rules and be within public financing.
Please correct your post and check your sources.

Has anyone actually seen this pledge?

http://www.prospect.org/csnc/blogs/tapped_archive?month=02&year=2008&base_name=would_you_make_a_pledge_with_t

Tapped seems to imply all Obama actually said was he'd look into the option and discuss it with the republican nominee and he asked the FEC if he could raise money in the primaries and use the public fund for the general.

Something must be wrong with my computer. It doesn't seem to want to show me the part of this post where it tells us when Hillary committed to public financing. I mean, she did commit to public financing, right? Because otherwise it would mean she's just being an desperate, opportunistic hypocrite who would say anything or do anything if she thought it might marginally advance her chances of winning. And I can't possibly believe that of Hillary. Not Hillary.

Mark Schmitt quotes/comments on Obama's actual statement:

I described this a few weeks ago as a "pledge" to participate, but I should not have. Obama's precise statement was, and has always been, "If I am the Democratic nominee, I will aggressively pursue an agreement with the Republican nominee to preserve a publicly financed general election." That's an artful statement, and it's not artful in a "meaning of 'is'" sense -- it's exactly the right answer. A commitment to "preserve a publicly financed election" would have to mean much more than whether both participate in the system. It would require some significant agreement about how to handle outside money, 527s, "Swift Boat"-type attack groups, party money, etc., and other factors that have undermined the last two publicly financed elections, from both sides. It is hardly an evasion to describe this as an agreement to be negotiated, rather than a simple pledge.

Obama's response should be:

To the McCain Camp - We'll discuss this after Denver.

To the Clinton amp- Ask if SHE intends to participate in public funding is SHE were to win the Democratic Nomination.

The sound of crickets will be deafening.

I missed Hillary's withdrawal statement. Damn, gotta stop sleeping late.

I don't see why Obama would accept public financing when he could blow McCain out of the water with fundraising. Good move on Obama's part...and I don't recall Obama signing a pledge to take public financing.

The Clinton campaign, however, should not be entering the fray from such a weak position. I know they want it to look like Obama is breaking a pledge, but joining McCain in pushing a bogus argument is not a good way to go IMO.

"Anyone else find it odd that the Clinton campaign is now coordinating their attacks with the McCain campaign?"

Not odd, totally in character.

The Clintons dont' mind harming the probably democratic nominee, as long as its not them.

They never cared about the DNC, only about the Clintons. That's why the dems lost the house, senate and white house after 8 years of their self-absorbed mismanagement.

I can easily imagine Hillary deciding that if she can't win, she'd rather the party lose in November, so she will fight until Denver, alienate the youth and blacks, and line up with McCain on attacks against Obama.

This is classic Hillary being Hillary.

Unmasked, I say.

Obama's response should hit these points.

The Clintons are attacking Senator Obama with the same ridiculous issue that the McCain campaign started on last week. We've always said Hillary's policies had a lot in common with McCain. Now she seems to be coordinating attacks on Senator Obama with the McCain campaign.

As for Senator Obama's plans to finance his general election campaign. You have to wonder why Senator Clinton knows that only the eventual Democratic nominee needs to worry about general election campaign finance? If the Clinton's are so ready to concede that Senator Obama will be the Democratic nominee, perhaps she should concede the race.

As for the Clinton's demand that Senator Obama restrict himself to public financing. The Clinton's themselves aren't now and have no plans to use public financing. Their plan would be to continue accepting millions of dollars from lobbyists and special interests. It's a hypocritical attack from a hypocritical candidate.

My take is that this entire line of attack is a big LOSER for both McCain and Clinton. This is because McCain is currently breaking the public financing laws. Once Obama starts responding to McCain's allegations by pointing out that McCain is currently and actively cheating the public finance laws, this whole issue will become so "inside baseball" for the average voter that McCain won't be able to use it as an effective attack.

I can't imagine that McCain wants his name associated with the words "Finance" "Cheating" and "Fraud". It could easily cause the media to re-educate voters about the Keating Five.

I just don't see a lot of attack mileage in attacking Obama for failing to come to a public financing agreement with a guy who is currently cheating under the public finance laws.

I think that the Clinton campain is now resorting to throwing everything at Obama to see what, if anything, will stick? Seems pretty desperate to me!

Goes along with their new message of the day strategy...