WASHINGTON (AP) - Change is coming, that much Sens. John McCain and Barack Obama agree on as they plunge into a five-month campaign for the White House.
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(Photo: AP Images)This combination of 2 photos shows Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., top, and Democratic presidential candidate, Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., bottom.
The primaries behind them, the presidential rivals were wasting no time drawing the battle line for a fall fight that will make history with the election of either the oldest first-term president in McCain or the first black leader in Obama. In speeches marking the start of the general election, both maneuvered for the advantage with voters sour on the status quo.
McCain, a four-term Arizona senator seeking to succeed a fellow Republican, uttered the word "change" more than 30 times as he tried to distance himself from President Bush and blister his Democratic rival. Obama uttered the phrase 19 times in a speech that claimed the Democratic presidential nomination.
"The wrong change looks not to the future but to the past for solutions that have failed us before and will surely fail us again," McCain, 71, said in suburban New Orleans. "I have a few years on my opponent, so I am surprised that a young man has bought into so many failed ideas."
In St. Paul, Minn., Obama, 46 and a first-term Illinois senator, ceded no ground on the reformer mantle and cast McCain as a continuation of the unpopular Bush's eight-year tenure.
"My differences with him are not personal; they are with the policies he has proposed in this campaign. Because while John McCain can legitimately tout moments of independence from his party in the past, such independence has not been the hallmark of his presidential campaign," Obama said.
The campaign is the first in half a century in which neither a sitting president nor a vice president is running for the highest office, and the first since 1960 in which a senator will assume the White House. A fragile economy and an ongoing Iraq war, as well as matters of age and race serve as a backdrop.
Both McCain and Obama were full of praise for defeated Democratic candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton as the two sought to make a play for her loyalist backers — women and working-class voters.
Clinton, the New York senator and former first lady, stopped short of dropping out of the race even though Obama had reached the requisite delegate count for the Democratic Party's nomination. Instead of conceding, Clinton said she would spend the next few days determining "how to move forward with the best interests of our country and our party guiding my way."
Behind the scenes, she maneuvered for the vice presidential spot on Obama's fall ticket, expressing a willingness in a conference call with her state's congressional delegation. "I am open to it" if it would help the party's prospects in November, Clinton replied, according to participants who spoke on condition of anonymity because the call was private. Obama's aides were noncommittal.
In the meantime, the party was swinging behind him.
"We have come to the end of an exciting primary and caucus process — the voters have spoken," four top party leaders said in a joint statement issued early Wednesday.
"Democrats must now turn our full attention to the general election," they continued. "To that end, we are urging all remaining uncommitted super delegates to make their decisions known by Friday of this week so that our party can stand united and begin our march toward reversing the eight years of failed Bush/McCain policies that have weakened our country." Continue >>
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agentorangex,
Ya-know, even though it totally doesn’t mean anything at all, I had to vote and give you thumbs down on your post. Disservice to the democratic process? By voting for unelectable persons? May I remind you that this America! I can vote for whoever I d@#! well please! Thank you very much.
Strudelcookies,
Ahhhhh yes, you'll be like the long list of other clowns who genuinely do a disservice to the democratic process by voting for unelectable persons; like how some find it necessary to vote for people not even on the ballot, or in some cases not even REAL people. It’s true, but sad, a small % of people actually vote for characters from ‘The Simpsons’. Two candidates can’t fully resemble all the ideals of all people nationally, and this is another good reason to have ‘run off’ styled elections.
Ok, so we have had a little fun this election season, mixed with a lot of damaging garbage.
Now we need to get real. Even from the Christians, I haven't seen "real" yet.
who is gona win? hmm i dont know. Obama has a great following and with Hillary supporting him (i am guessing but im sure she will), and maybe the VP slot will be given to her as well, they are gona win. And this means Truth has no value no place in USA again. Truth is the enemy of Darkness.
I'm writing in "Ron Paul" on my ballot. That way when anyone whines about the new president, I can say "Don't blame me! I voted for Ron Paul!"
Swordbearer, the is NO lesser of 2 evils......evil is evil regardless of how one might seek to marginalize one evil over the other. Murder is murder be it in the womb or on foreign soil, so, if we were to vote our convictions then we wouldnt cast a vote!
Five more months of hearing these guys talk, talk, talk, and dominate the news. I can’t wait for November 8th, when we will finally hear about others going on in the world.
Let's vote for the least of the two evils. McCain is Pro-life and Pro-Family. Obama is Pro-Choice and Pro-Homosexual marriage. As Christians we must vote according to our convictions. If we vote for Obama then we support the murder of innocent babies and the destruction of the Biblically based family and union of one man and one woman. Let's not fall for the hype of Obama's Charisma and take the wide road, the bandwagon that leads to destruction. Stay informed visit my blog.. www.answers2why.blog.com