COLUMBUS, Miss. — Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama bickered Monday about whether they will share the Democratic ticket in the fall, as Obama accused his rival of “gamesmanship” and the candidates sparred over who is more qualified to be commander in chief.
A day before a Mississippi primary that Obama is favored to win, he rejected Clinton’s idea that he become the vice-presidential nominee on a ticket her husband has described as “an almost unstoppable force.”
The senator from Illinois said the Clintons’ talk was designed to disguise his lead for the nomination and convince fence-sitters they could vote for Clinton and get Obama, too.
“First of all, with all due respect, I’ve won twice as many states as Sen. Clinton,” Obama said to cheers in Columbus. “I’ve won more of the popular vote than Sen. Clinton. I have more delegates than Sen. Clinton. So, I don’t know how somebody who’s in second place is offering the vice presidency to somebody who’s in first place.”
Obama also said, with evident delight, that the Clintons’ notion undermines their central challenge to his candidacy — that he is not prepared to be president.
“I don’t understand,” Obama told the crowd at the Mississippi University for Women. “If I’m not ready, how is it you think I would be such a great vice president?”
To emphasize his point, Obama cited a CBS News interview in May 1992, when candidate Bill Clinton said the most important criterion for the vice presidency was “someone who would be a good president if, God forbid, something happened to me a week after I took office.”
“You all know the okey-doke, when someone’s trying to bamboozle you, when they’re trying to hoodwink you,” Obama said. “You can’t say that ‘He’s not ready on Day One unless he’s willing to be your vice president, then he’s ready on Day One.’ ”
The duel over the Democrats’ readiness to lead the nation in a time of war has become a critical subtext as the party seeks a nominee to face Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., a Vietnam prisoner of war who counts national security as his strong suit.
The Clinton camp contends Obama is untested, while Obama’s campaign says Clinton showed poor judgment when she voted to authorize the Iraq war and backed President Bush’s effort to challenge Iran’s Republican Guard, which Obama on Monday called “saber-rattling.”
Clinton campaign spokesman Howard Wolfson said Monday that Obama has not proved his ability to be president but could by the time Clinton would choose a running mate — by August’s Democratic National Convention in Denver.
“Sen. Obama has not passed the commander-in-chief test,” Wolfson said, adding, “we have a long time between now and Denver.”
Asked what Obama could do to prove his worth by August, Wolfson avoided the question.
Clinton aides — and even some worried Obama supporters — believe Obama’s lead in the pledged-delegate count may not be enough. Neither candidate is likely to win the 2,025 delegates necessary to seal the nomination, meaning the 796 party officials and elected Democrats known as superdelegates could decide the nominee.
The Clinton campaign has worked to frame the race as anything but decided, and Obama aides say the talk of an Obama vice-presidential spot is part of that effort.
The vice presidency came up repeatedly at a news conference called by the Obama campaign to showcase former military leaders backing Obama. Clifford Alexander Jr., a former secretary of the Army, said, “People of all backgrounds — white, black, Latino — all see this is more surrealistic than any other sense.”
“There’s something of an implied compliment as well,” said Richard Danzig, secretary of the Navy under former President Clinton. “It’s nice to think Sen. Clinton thinks Sen. Obama’s clearly qualified to sit a heartbeat away from the presidency.”
