Clinton, Obama spar over past remarks ahead of party dinner

INDIANAPOLIS — Democratic presidential rivals Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton dueled on separate television talk shows Sunday as they prepared for yet another crucial primary showdown this week.

With voting set for Tuesday in Indiana and North Carolina, the two rivals hit the Sunday morning talk show circuit, taking aim at each other over the threat posed by Iran and the effectiveness of a gas-tax holiday.

Obama even likened Clinton to President Bush for a saber rattling threat to "totally obliterate'' Iran in the event of an Iranian attack on Israel. And Clinton renewed the ``elitist'' charge against Obama over his criticism of her gas-tax holiday proposal.

Both candidates continued the argument over gas taxes when they appeared Sunday night at a sold-out Jefferson-Jackson Dinner to raise funds for the Indiana Democratic Party.

"We can't just plan for the future, we have to help people in the here and now," Clinton said in pledging her "total commitment" to a summer suspension of the gasoline tax and to investigate whether oil companies are deliberately manipulating energy prices.

Obama told the same audience that oil companies would "simply jack up their price to fill the gap'' if such a gas tax holiday were observed. "Does anybody here really trust the oil companies to give you the savings instead of just pocketing the money themselves?'' he asked. "It's a shell game, literally."

Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean, who also appeared at the dinner, urged Democrats in both camps to remain committed to the party in the fall even if their candidate loses.

"The only thing that is going to stop us from winning the White House is us," Dean said. "In the long run, this is not about Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama. This is about our country."

The event came just two days before the Democratic presidential primaries in Indiana and North Carolina, contests that party officials hope will bring greater clarity to the contest for the

party's 2008 presidential nomination.

Obama leads Clinton in delegates won in the primaries and caucuses this year. But neither candidate can claim the nomination this summer without the backing of the party leaders and activists

who will vote on the nominee along with the regular delegates.

On NBC's ``Meet the Press'' on Sunday, Obama seized on a pledge Clinton made on April 22 in response to a question about what she would do if Iran attacked Israel. "I want the Iranians to know that if I'm the president, we will attack Iran,'' she said. "In the next 10 years, during which they might foolishly consider launching an attack on Israel, we would be able to totally obliterate them.''

Obama suggested that Clinton's comments are "not the language we need right now, and I think it's language reflective of George Bush.''

He added: "Senator Clinton, during the course of the campaign, has said we shouldn't speculate about Iran, we've got to be more cautious when we're running for president. She scolded me on a

couple of occasions on this issue. Yet a few days before an election, she's willing to use that language.''

Obama also dismissed Clinton's gas-tax proposal as "a classic Washington gimmick'' that has no chance of becoming law. "What this is is a strategy to get through the next election,'' he said.

But Clinton, in an appearance on ABC's ``This Week,'' defended her plan to suspend federal gas taxes over the summer and, in doing so, resurrected the suggestions that Obama is out of touch with working-class Americans.

"I'm not going to put my lot in with economists,'' she said in response to a question on whether economists supported her proposal. ``We've got to get out of this mind-set where somehow

elite opinion is always on the side of doing things that really disadvantage the vast majority of Americans.''

However, the Obama campaign aired new TV ads in Indiana and North Carolina calling her proposal a ``gas-tax gimmick'' that ``won't do much'' for voters but ``would help (Clinton)

politically.''

Clinton, responding to Obama's charges of saber rattling on Iran, said she has no regrets about making such threats.

"Why would I have any regrets? I'm asked a question about what I would do if Iran attacked our ally . . . and, yes, we would have massive retaliation against Iran,'' she said. "I don't think they will do that, but I sure want to make it abundantly clear to them that they would face a tremendous cost if they did such a thing.''