Obama's new two front battle

Washington Post:

With losses in three out of four primaries yesterday, Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) and his campaign face a scenario that a barrage of advertising, phone calls and door-knocking could not avert -- a protracted, two-front war against Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton and the presumptive Republican nominee, Sen. John McCain.

Even before the polls opened, campaign officials were dreading an outcome that would keep Clinton (D-N.Y.) in the race at least through the Pennsylvania primary on April 22. Those seven weeks will cost Obama at least $10 million, and possibly much more, campaign aides say, as he battles a rejuvenated Clinton who will have every incentive to try to force him into a major mistake.

Obama aides also expect to take concentrated fire from McCain (Ariz.) and his Republican allies, who have already begun raising questions about the 46-year-old Democratic senator's credibility, authenticity and even his patriotism.

For months before his victory in Iowa, doubters questioned whether Obama had the stomach to deliver the blows necessary to wear down Clinton's advantages. Now, the question is whether he can take a punch -- "and you know they will be coming," said former Iowa governor Tom Vilsack (D), a Clinton supporter.

Some Obama supporters are increasing pressure on him to shift tactics, frame more sharply his criticism of his opponents and begin inoculating himself from the GOP attacks, but Obama remains reluctant to change the approaches that he still thinks will secure him the nomination. "I have said consistently that we do things differently," Obama said. "It's worked for us so far. And I'm not going to do things that I'm not comfortable in doing."

To be sure, Obama campaign aides think the defeats yesterday in Ohio, Rhode Island and Texas will not alter his path to the Democratic nomination. Under the Democratic Party's system of distributing delegates proportionately, Obama will maintain a lead in pledged delegates, and any diminishment of that delegate lead is likely to be recouped in Saturday's Wyoming caucuses and next Tuesday's Mississippi primary.

"No matter what happens tonight, we have nearly the same delegate lead we had this morning," Obama said last night in San Antonio, "and we are on our way to winning this nomination."

Obama aides stressed that the campaign will not be drawn into a fight for Pennsylvania on Clinton's terms: an expensive, all-out battle focused on her. Instead, the campaign's main target will be McCain -- a point underscored by Obama when he declared himself "ready to start a great debate about the future of the country with a man who loves his country and served it bravely."

But Democratic leaders outside the campaign are worried that a candidate who cruised through his only Senate campaign, in 2004, does not know what is about to hit him. Republicans are already planting the seeds for a negative campaign designed to make one overarching point, said Rep. Artur Davis (D-Ala.), an Obama supporter and informal adviser: This man is not who you think he is.

"You have to question whether he is equipped to deal with the complex and serious issues that are facing the nation," said Danny Diaz, the Republican National Committee's communications director.

...

McCain has already made clear how he will try to brand Obama if they are opponents in November, drawing on the Illinois Democrat's Senate votes on abortion, taxes and guns as evidence that he is out of the mainstream.

...

As part of the wide-ranging case they have begun constructing, they plan to follow some of the threads that Clinton has already exposed: Obama's ties to Chicago businessman Antoin "Tony" Rezko; the senator's failure to hold hearings on Afghanistan in his Senate Foreign Relations subcommittee; his decision to repeatedly vote "present" in the Illinois legislature.

...

I think the McCain campaign will be much more sophisticated than that. It will put Obama on the defensive on Iraq, health care, and foreign policy in general. Many in the media still do not see Obama's vulnerability on the issue of Iraq, because they tend to agree with him and ignore his naive answers to questions about Iraq. they are also ignoring his incoherent strategy for Iraq.

I don't think the McCain campaign will have to do much of the work on the Rezco connection. Clinton will continue to hammer him on that issue and the media will eventually start digging. What could really hurt him is the money trail through Rezco to a pro Saddam billionaire Iraq who evidently funded Rezco's assistance to Obama. That has the potential of undermining his "saintly" views on the Iraq war and make them look more like self interest.