


Opponents said that would split the AFL-CIO's 56 member unions, weakening their clout. McEntee was forced to back off.
"We didn't have the so-called magic number," McEntee said. "We are pressing for individual unions to endorse her and provide soldiers, boots on the ground."
Harold Schaitberger, general president of the International Association of Fire Fighters, an AFL-CIO affiliate, was among those who opposed lowering the threshold.
"Beyond those unions who initiated the discussion, there was zero appetite among the AFL-CIO's executive council to change the federation's long-standing endorsement policy in order to jam an endorsement for a candidate," he said.
Change to Win, a rival labor federation, is putting financial and organizational muscle behind Obama. That's rekindling some of the animosity left from when Service Employees International Union President Andy Stern led the charge to form Change to Win three years ago after a dispute with Sweeney.
McEntee noted Obama lost in the three states last week where Change to Win had a presence.
"It was their first run out of the gate and it looked like they got stuck," he said.
The 2008 presidential race continues to shatter turnout records. Democrats have set primary voting highs in 19 states so far, and Republicans set records in 11 states, according to Curtis Gans, director of the Center for the Study of the American Electorate at American University in Washington.
While Republican interest ebbed since Super Tuesday on Feb. 5, when John McCain took a commanding lead for the nomination, Democrats still are heading to the polls in unprecedented numbers as Clinton, 60, and Obama, 46, fight it out.
Republicans may step up in November if Clinton is the nominee. "She tends to mobilize Republicans," Gans said.
A total of about 28.7 million Democrats have voted so far and Clinton and Obama are virtually tied in the popular vote. About 17.4 million Republicans have turned out.
McCain is working on what allies and adversaries alike regard as his biggest weakness: the economy.
"He's not as strong an expositor as he could be, and that's something he, quite frankly, would like to improve on," said Douglas Holtz-Eakin, McCain's senior economic policy adviser.
Adviser Charlie Black argues McCain already has a "fairly specific tax cut program" and will "flesh out some other economic ideas as we go."
That includes getting rid of the alternative minimum tax, cutting corporate tax rates from 35 percent to 25 percent and making a tax credit for research and development permanent.
Aides are researching how to pay for those. Eliminating congressional earmarks, a longtime McCain cause, "gets you in the neighborhood of $20 billion a year," and there are savings to be had by reforming Pentagon purchasing, Black said.
"We've talked about the possibility of means-testing the prescription drug benefit," he said.
McCain, 71, an Arizona senator, said yesterday he is having conversations "with smart people" about his economic platform.
"It's pretty obvious that the economy is most on people's minds now," he said in Atlanta.
Obama is on the offensive after taking blows from Clinton.
"You set the terms of the debate, and you got to live by the terms of the debate," said David Axelrod, the Illinois senator's chief strategist.
The entire campaign is diving in. Obama adviser Susan Rice, a former assistant secretary of state under President Bill Clinton, accused Hillary Clinton of "deception" by overstating her involvement in diplomacy as first lady.
"It's hard to know what she's referring to when she says she has this unparalleled foreign policy experience," she said.
Some punches are too hard. Another Obama foreign policy adviser, Samantha Power, resigned yesterday after she was quoted in a Scottish newspaper calling Clinton "a monster."
Clinton's advisers say her wins in Ohio and Texas provide a road map for Pennsylvania, the next big state to vote. They regard the "3 a.m. phone call" television ad run in Texas as particularly effective. It depicted a ringing White House phone and asked voters who they would want to handle the call.
Senior spokesman Mo Elleithee disputed the notion that amounts to negative campaigning. "That's totally within bounds," he said. "We see a much more negative edge coming out of the Obama campaign."
A long, multistate campaign takes its toll. Obama, who spent 20 minutes shaking hands with people at Johnny J's diner in Casper, Wyoming, ordered up a vanilla milkshake and a piece of coconut cream pie and walked outside. "It's really nice in Wisconsin," he said, hesitating for a beat, "and Wyoming."
(rep-am.com)