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ON THE TRAIL

May 20, 2008

Barack Obama has a message for Tennessee's Republican Party: "Lay off my wife." Obama and his wife, Michelle, were asked in an interview aired yesterday on ABC's "Good Morning America" about an online video last week by the state's GOP taking her to task for a comment some considered unpatriotic. "The GOP, should I be the nominee, can say whatever they want to say about me, my track record," Obama said. "If they think that they're going to try to make Michelle an issue in this campaign, they should be careful because that I find unacceptable ... ." The video, posted on YouTube, centered on remarks Michelle Obama made while campaigning in Wisconsin in February. "For the first time in my adult life, I am really proud of my country." Obama later clarified the remark, saying she meant she was proud of how Americans were engaging in the political process and that she had always been proud of her country.

The White House yesterday called on NBC News to set the record straight on "deceitful" editing of an interview with President George W. Bush, in which a correspondent asks whether comments about the president of Iran were directed at Barack Obama. Bush aides were angered by how the president's answer was portrayed when Richard Engel questioned him about his condemnation of "the false comfort of appeasement" last week. NBC stood by its treatment of the interview. Bush had mentioned the president of Iran, saying: "Some seem to believe that we should negotiate with the terrorists and radicals, as if some ingenious argument will persuade them they have been wrong all along." Engel asked Bush if he was referring to Obama in his speech. As it appeared on "Nightly News" Sunday and the "Today" show yesterday, Bush's response was: "You know, my policies haven't changed, but evidently the political calendar has ... And when, you know, a leader of Iran says that they want to destroy Israel, you've got to take those words seriously." But the White House said NBC edited out these words that Bush said between those two sentences: "People need to read the speech. You didn't get it exactly right, either. What I said was that we need to take the words of people seriously."