Clinton’s Hill helpers bash Obama over ‘present’ votes

Congressional members supporting Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) ripped into Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) in a conference call with reporters Thursday that was set up by the campaign.

{mosads}Democratic Reps. Anthony Weiner (N.Y.), Joseph Crowley (N.Y.) and Stephanie Tubbs Jones (Ohio) all joined Clinton adviser Howard Wolfson on the call to hit Obama for the number of “present” votes he cast while in the Illinois state Senate.

After The New York Times published a story Thursday reporting that Obama voted “present” — instead of yes or no — almost 130 times, the Clinton campaign and her congressional surrogates told reporters that Obama’s record was an indication that he is not a strong leader and unwilling to take a stand.

“He took what many of us in public life would say is the easy way out,” Weiner said.

The campaign acknowledged, as Obama has said, that some of his votes were strategic in nature and designed to help a politically vulnerable colleague.

But Wolfson charged that on the many votes where Obama was the only “present” vote, Obama “took a pass.”

“Sen. Obama says he’s going to fight for his positions,” Weiner said. “In order to do that you have to have a position.”

Weiner said Obama appeared to employ a strategy of building an “intentionally vague” record to avoid the need to defend controversial votes in later elections.

Tubbs Jones said Obama “avoided taking stands on tough issues” like gun control, abortion rights and taxes.

“These latest politically motivated attacks from the Clinton team, in the middle of their ‘likability tour,’ come at the eleventh hour of a closely contested campaign in which Obama is rising in the polls and picking up key endorsements,” said Obama spokeswoman Jen Psaki.