Obama, McCain Scuffle Over Vets’ Benefits
From wire reports
BAYAMON, Puerto Rico
Barack Obama told veterans Saturday that he can’t understand why Republican John McCain opposes legislation that would provide college scholarships to people who have served in the U.S. military.
“Now, let me be clear: No one can dispute John McCain’s love for this country or his concern for veterans. But here’s what I don’t understand. I don’t understand why John McCain would side with George Bush and oppose our plan to make college more affordable for our veterans,” Obama said. “George Bush and John McCain may think our plan is too generous. I could not disagree more.”
Obama’s criticism renews a clash that turned personal Thursday after the Senate approved the bill, sponsored by Sen. Jim Webb, D- Va.
During the Senate debate, the Illinois senator questioned why McCain – a Navy veteran and former prisoner of war – would oppose the measure.
McCain responded with a sharp statement saying that he wouldn’t listen to any lectures on veterans’ affairs from Obama, “who did not feel it was his responsibility to serve our country in uniform.”
The Arizona senator opposes the scholarship measure, as does the Pentagon, because it applies to people who serve just three years. McCain says it would encourage people to leave the military after only one enlistment even as the U.S. fights two wars and is trying to increase the size of its forces .
Instead, McCain and Republican colleagues proposed a bill to increase benefits in conjunction with a veteran’s length of service. Senate Democrats blocked that measure.
“While Barack Obama engages in the same tired partisan politics that has failed our veterans time and again, John McCain has offered legislation that will expand needed education benefits for veterans while promoting retention in our armed forces,” McCain spokesman Brian Rogers responded Saturday.
With a Democratic presidential primary to be held in Puerto Rico on June 1, both Obama and Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton are spending the holiday weekend campaigning in the Caribbean.
Puerto Rico will send 63 delegates to the Democratic convention, more than the combined total of Montana and South Dakota, the two states that vote June 3. B ecause the island is a semi-autonomous commonwealth and not a state, only Puerto Ricans living on the mainland can cast presidential ballots in November.
On Saturday, Obama told a Puerto Rican radio station that he takes Clinton at her word when she said she meant no harm by invoking Sen. Robert Kennedy’s assassination in speaking about the current Democratic race.
“I have learned that, when you are campaigning for as many months as Sen. Clinton and I have been campaigning, sometimes you get careless in terms of the statements that you make, and I think that is what happened here,” Obama, said . “Senator Clinton says that she did not intend any offense by it, and I will take her at her word on that.”
Clinton told a South Dakota newspaper Friday that history pointed to primary results changing course in the summer, citing her husband’s campaign in 1992 and the 1968 race, when, she said, “we all remember Bobby Kennedy was assassinated in June in California.” Her aides said she meant only to refer to examples of primary season running into June.
This story was compiled from reports from The Associated Press, The New York Times and The Washington Post.
opposing views
Barack Obama, above left, questions why John McCain, center , opposes legislation that would provide college scholarships to people who have served in the U.S. military.
McCain opposes the measure because it applies to people who serve just three years. He proposed a bill to increase benefits in conjunction with a veteran’s length of service. upcoming primaries
June 1 Puerto Rico, 63 delegates
June 3 Montana, 24 delegates South Dakota, 23 delegates
Delegate count Barack Obama 1,972 Hillary Rodham Clinton 1,780 Total needed for nomination 2,026
Source: The Associated Press
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