Obama Returns Fire, Questions Clinton’s Foreign Policy “Experience”
Sunday, March 2nd, 2008Senator Barack Obama was introduced by Senator Jay Rockefeller at two Ohio campaign events today, where the West Virginia senator defended Obama’s foreign policy credentials, which have recently come into question by Senator Hillary Clinton in her new TV ad that asks viewers who they would want answering the phone at the White House at 3am in the event of a crisis.
Rockefeller, chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, told reporters traveling with the Obama campaign that he is “more qualified on national security judgments and actions” than any other candidate running - including John McCain.
At an afternoon town hall meeting in Westerville, Ohio, Obama responded to Clinton’s criticism that his foreign policy experience lies solely on the speech he gave in 2002 denouncing the war. He also criticized Clinton for not reading the National Intelligence Estimate report - something he said Senator Jay Rockefeller did read. He continued, “I don’t know what all that experience got her because I have enough experience to know that if you have a National Intelligence Estimate, and the chairman of the national, the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee says, ‘you should read this - this is why I’m voting against the war,’ - that you should probably read it.”
What Obama didn’t make clear however, is that while Jay Rockefeller is the current chairman of the committee, he was not in 2002 - nor did Rockefeller vote against the resolution. The then-chairman of the Intelligence Committee did, however, and that was former Senator Bob Graham. The campaign says Obama was referring to Mr. Graham - not Mr. Rockefeller in his remarks.
Watch those remarks here:
Following Obama’s town hall, Senator Rockefeller was asked about Mrs. Clinton’s claim that she was fully briefed on the content of the NIE report. “I don’t really know what that means when you’re fully briefed. I mean, who is going to brief her?” Only senators and Intelligence staff can read the briefing, Rockefeller said. “It’s not the kind of thing that you just get briefed on,” he said.
