Obama points to new way

Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama on Thursday criticized rival Hillary Clinton for actions that he said contributed to an apparent drumbeat for military confrontation with Iran.

"Senator Clinton thinks in very conventional terms when it come to our foreign policy," he said in an interview while visiting Nevada.

"I think that's part of what led her to authorize the war in Iraq. It's what led her to vote for the Kyl-Lieberman amendment. She and I have had disagreements about the need for aggressive presidential diplomacy when it comes to not just talking to our friends, but also to our enemies."

The Senate recently voted to designate Iran's Revolutionary Guard a terrorist force in a measure, the Kyl-Lieberman amendment, that Clinton supported. While Obama missed the vote, he opposes the move, he said, because it appears to be "a rationale for keeping troops in Iraq and a justification for an attack on Iran."

Clinton has defended her vote by saying the amendment is intended to put diplomatic pressure on Iran and thus avert, rather than provoke, a military conflict. But Obama, who opposed the Iraq war before it began, has sought to parallel the Iran vote with the Iraq war authorization in 2002 that Clinton also voted for.

The time is past for such thinking, the Illinois senator said. "It's a question of how much we want to break away from the legacy of the Bush administration and start to repair the damage that's been done."

Obama on Thursday held a rally in Reno, then flew south, hosting about 1,500 supporters at Cheyenne High School in North Las Vegas. It was his eighth visit to Nevada.

The Las Vegas speech focused on "the lessons of Iraq, and how we not only bring an end to the war but more importantly prevent making mistakes in the future."

Asking his audience's forgiveness for a lengthy discourse on foreign policy, Obama, standing in front of a gigantic U.S. flag that hung from the ceiling, made many of the same points about "conventional thinking," but without naming Clinton.

The audience was patient, if not wildly enthusiastic, during this lecture. But when, after going into detail about his withdrawal plan, Obama repeated, adamantly, several times, "I will end this war," he drew a standing ovation.

Obama spoke for about half an hour and took a few questions afterward, including one from an 11-year-old girl on gasoline prices. He brought the answer back partly to his main theme: "Part of the reason that gas prices are high is because the world market is anticipating another war in the Middle East."

With his top rival showing no signs of relinquishing her lead in the polls, Obama appears to be the only one not worried about whether he still has a chance, in Nevada or in general. In the interview, he said his timing would be right.

"Our strategy has always been to not win an election in September but to win it in January, February and March," he said. "We feel very good about the direction we're going."

A recent Review-Journal poll showed Clinton with a double-digit lead on Obama among likely Democratic caucus goers, by a margin of 39 percent to 21 percent. But Obama pointed out that an R-J poll in May had him at 12 percent. "If we keep going up 9 (points) every month, we're going to be doing pretty good," he said.

Clinton has sought to burnish her Nevada credentials by scheduling hearings of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee on the proposed nuclear waste repository at Nevada's Yucca Mountain. All of the Democratic candidates are opposed to the project, while the Republicans either are in favor or have not taken a clear position.

Obama said it was "great that we have hearings," but having rejected the idea of the dump, "what I'd want to spend time on is what the alternatives are going to be as opposed to focusing on simply the past." Asked if he would attend, he said, "It depends whether I'm in Washington or not."

And if he is in Washington? "I am not on the environment committee, but I've made my position on Yucca very clear. I think the people of Nevada can be confident that as president, I'm going to be looking for different options for storing nuclear waste."

Contact reporter Molly Ball at mball@reviewjournal.com or (702) 387-2919.