Patriotism spat tars latest round of Clinton-Obama battle

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WASHINGTON, Mar 23 (AFP): The campaigns of the Democratic White House hopefuls braced for fierce confrontation Sunday, after former president Bill Clinton appeared to question the patriotism of his wife Hillary's rival, Barack Obama.
In the latest sparring match between the increasingly bitter fight for the Democratic presidential nomination, an Obama aide hit back by likening ex-president Clinton to communist-hunting 1950s senator Joseph McCarthy.
Just weeks before a crucial primary clash in the state of Pennsylvania, which will go a long way to deciding who will face off Republican John McCain in the November election, former president Clinton sparked a new row.
"I think it would be a great thing if we had an election year where you had two people who loved this country and were devoted to the interest of this country," he told a group of veterans Friday in Charlotte, North Carolina.
"And people could actually ask themselves who is right on these issues, instead of all this other stuff that always seems to intrude itself on our politics."
Clinton was apparently referring to his wife and McCain, leaving Obama out in the cold.
Obama advisor Merrill McPeak, a retired air force general, responded on Saturday saying: "As one who for 37 years proudly wore the uniform of our country, I'm saddened to see a president employ these kind of tactics."
"He of all people should know better because he was the target of exactly the same kind of tactic when he first ran 16 years ago," he told Obama supporters in Medford, Oregon, with the Illinois senator at his side.
McPeak apparently referred to attacks Bill Clinton sustained in the 1992 campaign from then-president George HW Bush, who had raised questions about a trip Clinton took to Moscow in 1970 during the Vietnam war.
McPeak's criticism was even blunter Friday, when he said, according to television reports, that Bill Clinton's comments "sounds more like McCarthy."
"I grew up, I was going to college when Joe McCarthy was accusing good Americans of being traitors, so I've had enough of it," he said.
Hillary Clinton's campaign swiftly denounced McPeak's comments as "a pathetic misreading" of the president's remarks.