MoveOn and California SEIU Endorse Obama
The Associated Press

Friday 01 February 2008

Los Angeles - Barack Obama picked up the endorsement of a leading anti-war group Friday
and said Democratic presidential rival Hillary Rodham Clinton still has not adequately
explained her vote to go into Iraq.

Obama told reporters in a news conference that, even though Clinton explains how she would
like to end the war, her explanation for her vote leading into the war is disingenuous. He said
his opposition against the war from the start will make him the stronger rival to Republican
front-runner and war backer John McCain in the general election.

Obama's long-standing opposition to the war helped him pick up the backing of MoveOn.org,
a liberal network which counts 3.2 million members and decided to back him by a vote of 70% to
30% for Clinton. The group said Friday that it has 1.7 million members in the 22 states
scheduled to vote in the race Tuesday, and it would immediately begin a campaign to get them
behind Obama.

Obama also picked up the support of a large union in California which had been backing
rival John Edwards, who dropped out of the race this week.

MoveOn.org executive director Eli Pariser said the country needs a president to end the
war, provide universal health care, address climate change, restore America's standing in the
world and "change business as usual in Washington." In his statement, Pariser thanked all the
other candidates who ran in the Democratic primary for their contributions to the race.

Obama criticized Clinton's answer during a debate Thursday night when she was asked why
she voted against a 2003 amendment offered by Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich. The amendment would have
given weapons inspectors more time in Iraq and required President Bush to first obtain U.N.
approval before using force. Clinton argued that a vote for the Levin amendment would have
subordinated U.S. authority in Iraq to the U.N. Security Council and called it a troublesome
precedent.

She reiterated her explanation of the 2002 vote to give President Bush authority to use
military force to oust Saddam Hussein. But she added, "If I had known then what I know now, I
never would have given President Bush the authority. It was a sincere vote based on my
assessment at the time and what I believed he would do with the authority he was given. He
abused that authority; he misused that authority."

She declined to say the vote was a mistake. Obama criticized her explanation in his news
conference, the third he's held this week leading into the Super Tuesday contests. Clinton
holds a lead in the polling in most of those states.

"I think there continues to be a suggestion that it was not a vote for war, and I thought
that her explanation with respect to the Levin amendment was inaccurate," Obama said. "Anyone
who looks at the Levin amendment knows that we were not ceding sovereignty in some fashion to
the United Nations."

In Sacramento, one of California's largest unions, the Service Employees International
Union, decided to throw its support to Obama, spokeswoman Jeanine Meyer Rodriguez told the
Associated Press.

The president of the state council, Annelle Grajeda, was to formally announce the
endorsement in a statement later Friday.

The 650,000-member union's backing could help Obama cut into Clinton's lead in California
polls of Democratic base voters, many of whom are union members. The SEIU includes city, county
and state workers, as well as in-home support and health care workers.

Union officials will urge their members to vote for Obama but do not plan to do a wider
get-out-the-vote effort.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/politics/election2008/2008-02-01-moveon_...
Is that a good thing?!! I would reconsider my primary vote next week..that is