Hillary and Obama respond to critics

By Libby The old and new media outcry over the latest round of negative politics in the Democratic primary seems to have had some effect. Hillary's latest remarks, in the miltary heart of North Carolina, were encouraging. Clinton stressed that there are “significant” differences between her and Obama, but said “those differences pale to the differences between us and Sen. McCain.” “I intend to do everything I can to make sure we have a unified Democratic party,” she said. “When this contest is over and we have a nominee, we’re going to close ranks, we’re going to be united.” Meanwhile as Steven Benen sums up in his usual impeccable manner, Obama was even more responsive to the criticisms. It looks like the Obama campaign got the message. The senator delivered a speech at Cooper Union in NYC this morning on the economy, specifically emphasizing “legal reforms needed to establish a 21st century regulatory system.” From a purely political perspective, I’d just add that Obama did so a) while exposing the disaster of Bush’s economic policies; b) trashing McCain’s speech on the economy from Tuesday; and c) without mentioning Hillary Clinton, in any context, even once. That's exactly what we need. I'm tired of hearing why one candidate or the other is going to run better against McCain. I want them to show us how they're going to do it by running against McCain now, instead of each other. I don't think I'm the only one.