2008 US Presidential Election.

AN EARLIER VOTE WOULD NOT GUARANTEE A DECISIVE ROLE IN CHOOSING PRESIDENT

By Philip J. Trounstine

California’s rush toward an early primary is swirling through the Legislature, and it looks like it will be a done deal within weeks. With support from both parties and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, it’s a near certainty that the state’s 2008 primary will be moved up from June, and that we’ll be voting Feb. 5 for presidential contenders next year.

That will put the contest for the largest bloc of delegates needed to win a party nomination at the front end of the nominating process, right after Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina — states that have conspired with the presidential contenders and party leaders to place themselves at the head of the calendar, defying all rationality.

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They don’t have any cute, little children begging for more books.

No professors march to the Capitol to rally lawmakers for support in matching T-shirts.

And zealous parents have not organized an e-mail campaign to apply election-year pressure.

Lobbying the Legislature for more money has not been the strength of Mississippi’s eight universities in recent years - especially when compared to the advocates for kindergarten through 12th grade education.

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BERLIN, N.H. (AP) - Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton faced tough questions Saturday from New Hampshire voters skeptical about her stand on the Iraq war, including one who demanded that she repudiate her 2002 Senate vote to send U.S. troops into battle.

In her first presidential campaign visit to the early voting state, Clinton sought to focus on her plans to revive struggling small-town economies, universal health care and making college more affordable. But at a crowded town hall meeting of some 350 people, Clinton was peppered with questions about Iraq.

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CONCORD, New Hampshire — Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton faced questions Saturday from New Hampshire voters skeptical about her stand on the Iraq war, including one who demanded that she repudiate her 2002 Senate vote to send U.S. troops into battle.

In her first presidential campaign visit to the early voting state, Clinton focused on her plans to revive struggling small-town economies, provide universal health care and make college more affordable. But at a town hall meeting in rural Berlin, New Hampshire, and at a boisterous gathering of some 3,000 people in the state capital, Concord, Ms. Clinton was peppered with …

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CONCORD – Questions over her 2002 vote to authorize the Iraq war marked the first day of New Hampshire campaigning for Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton.

The New York senator hosted two public events Saturday and both town hall-style forums ended with stiff questioning about her past voting record and present plans for Iraq.

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WATERLOO, Iowa (AFP) - Barack Obama (news, bio, voting record) was taking to the ice-bound campaign trail, a day after launching his 2008 White House bid with a vow to lead a generational drive to purge the cynicism from US politics.

The charismatic 45-year-old senator opened his quest for the Democratic nomination in Illinois, invoking anti-slavery icon Abraham Lincoln as he set his sights on a historic goal — to become the first black US president.

Obama demanded an end to the “tragic” war in Iraq and said he felt a call of destiny to transform his nation.

“Let’s be the generation that ends poverty in America,” Obama told a outdoor crowd of thousands in frigid temperatures in the midwestern city of Springfield, former president Lincoln’s hometown.

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SPRINGFIELD, Ill. - Barack Obama (news, bio, voting record) announced his bid for president Saturday, a black man evoking Abraham Lincoln’s ability to unite a nation and a Democrat portraying himself as a fresh face capable of leading a new generation.

“Let us transform this nation,” he told thousands shivering in the cold at the campaign’s kickoff.

Obama, 45, is the youngest candidate in the Democrats’ 2008 primary field dominated by front-runner Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton and filled with more experienced lawmakers. In an address from the state capital where he began his elective career 10 years ago, the first-term U.S. senator sought to distinguish himself as a staunch opponent of the Iraq war and a White House hopeful whose lack of political experience is an asset.

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CONCORD, New Hampshire (Reuters) - Democratic presidential contender Hillary Rodham Clinton on Saturday attacked President George W. Bush for “arrogance and incompetence” in Iraq but faced tough questions over her own vote to authorize the war.

On her first visit in a decade to the state that helps kick off the 2008 White House race, Clinton told voters in New Hampshire that Iraq was a challenge because of “the arrogance and incompetence of our administration in Washington.”

At a town hall meeting of about 300 people in the city of Berlin, the New York senator was asked by one participant to repudiate her 2002 Senate vote for a measure that cleared the way for the March 2003 invasion.

“Knowing what we know now, I would never have voted for it,” she responded. “I gave him the authority to send inspectors back in to determine the truth. I said this is not a vote to authorize pre-emptive war.”

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GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. - Republicans Mitt Romney and Sen. Sam Brownback (news, bio, voting record) promoted their presidential campaigns before nearly 3,000 party activists at the Michigan GOP convention Saturday.

Romney reminded the crowd that he grew up sharing the Automotive News each morning with his father, George, who headed American Motors Corp. before serving as Michigan’s governor from 1963 to 1969.

The younger Romney, a former Massachusetts governor, said his father brought many of the lessons he learned from business to the governorship.

“He got Michigan moving again,” Romney said, before running through his stands in opposition to abortion and same-sex marriage and in favor of tight controls on illegal immigration. “It’s time for Republican principles to come back to Michigan again.”

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CONCORD, N.H. - Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton faced questions Saturday from New Hampshire voters skeptical about her stand on the Iraq war, including one who demanded that she repudiate her 2002 Senate vote to send U.S. troops into battle.

In her first presidential campaign visit to the early voting state, Clinton focused on her plans to revive struggling small-town economies, provide universal health care and make college more affordable. But at a town hall meeting in rural Berlin and at a boisterous gathering of some 3,000 people in the state capital, Concord, Clinton was peppered with questions about Iraq.

Most of the questions were cordial, and Clinton was loudly cheered when she repeated her pledge to end the war if she is elected president next year. But several attendees challenged the New York senator to explain how she could reconcile her sharp criticism of the war with her vote to authorize the original invasion.

“Aren’t you trying to have it both ways?” asked a man in Concord.

Clinton acknowledged “a great deal of frustration and anger and outrage” over the war, and said she was working hard in the Senate to pass legislation capping troop levels in Iraq. She also vowed to try to bring to a vote a resolution disapproving of President Bush’s planned troop increase.

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SPRINGFIELD, United States (AFP) - Senator Barack Obama (news, bio, voting record) launched “an improbable quest” to become America’s first black president, audaciously invoking Abraham Lincoln, the US president who ended slavery.

“I want us to take up the unfinished business of perfecting our union, and building a better America,” Obama told a crowd of thousands in temperatures of minus 11 degrees Celsius (13 Fahrenheit) in Lincoln’s hometown.

“You didn’t come here just for me, you came here because you believe in what this country can be,” said the Illinois senator, 45, muscling his way into a packed Democratic field already dominated by New York Senator Hillary Clinton.

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