Obama Takes Shot at Tuzla

Senator Obama, like many politicians before him, promised to bring us a "new kind of politics." Since that first gleaming promise, a number of missteps and mischaracterizations have left some of us wondering exactly what is new about the campaign's politics.

The Democratic debate this week has prompted a lot of frustration among supporters of the Senator's campaign, charging everything from irrelevance to downright partisan hackery. Senator Obama, in a controversial appearance in North Carolina on Thursday, called the debate the "roll-out of the Republican campaign against me in November."

His supporters, his campaign, and the Senator himself have had harsh words this week, suggesting that the debate was an unjust hit job. They felt these types of "gotcha" politics are nasty, negative, and not necessary.

It seems, however, that such criticism does not apply to campaign conference calls. ABC's Political Radar reports that the Obama camp went for the jugular this week on Hillary's Tuzla moment, holding a new kind of conference call during which they actually rolled out three Bosnian war veterans to discuss the ways in which Senator Clinton had dishonored them.

During the call with reporters, which classified Senator Clinton as having poor character, no honor and failing in leadership, Senator Obama's campaign showed an eagerness for "gotcha" politics that would put George Stephanopoulos to shame. Although pro-Obama blogs and leading Democratic blogs like Dailykos are rending garments and wailing lamentations following the debate, it seems the Obama campaign didn't actually find the ABC questioning of Senator Clinton all that unfair.

The Clinton campaign responded immediately on their own conference call. Communications Director Howard Wolfson noted, "Boy when the Obama campaign decides to go negative, they really go negative!" Wolfson also pointed out that during Wednesday's debate Senator Obama made a point of the fact that his campaign had only discussed the Tuzla moment when asked about it by reporters.

The Obama campaign has spent several days outraged over so-called "gotcha" politics. They suggest such things aren't of interest to Democratic voters, that these issues don't speak to character. When it comes to Tuzla, however, the Obama campaign is ready to open fire. Of course, that's how sniper fire works ... from behind cover.