Obama Ridicules 'Dream Team' Hints from Clinton; Poll Says Dems Favor Both on Ticket

WASHINGTON — Even as the campaign for the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination grows harsher, Hillary and Bill Clinton are floating the idea of a "dream ticket" with Barack Obama, an extraordinary piece of political calculus that Obama himself dismissed Monday as "gamesmanship."

Campaigning in Mississippi on the eve of that state's presidential primary, Obama ridiculed Hillary Clinton's repeated hints that she would take him as her vice presidential running mate in the general election against presumptive Republican nominee John McCain this fall.

"I do not believe Senator Clinton is about change because in fact this kind of gamesmanship - talking about me as vice president, but 'maybe he's not ready for commander in chief' - that's exactly the kind of double-speak, double-talk that Washington is very good at," Obama told a crowd in Columbus, Miss.

"I don't know how somebody who is in second place is offering the vice presidency to somebody who is in first place," said Obama, who leads his rival in the number of national convention delegates he has won. "I'm not running for vice president. I am running for president of the United States of America. I am running to be commander in chief," he added.

During a conference call with reporters, Clinton spokesman Howard Wolfson was asked about the contradiction of touting Obama as a vice presidential candidate while condemning his ability to lead. He answered, "We do not believe Senator Obama has passed the commander in chief test. But there is a long way to go between now and Denver."

Analysts suggested it is a clever tactic for Clinton, with the two candidates for the 2008 Democratic nomination in a virtual tie and little chance of either winning enough delegates in the remaining primaries and caucuses to claim the nomination outright at the national convention in Denver in August.

"It both compliments and diminishes Obama at the same time," said John Pitney, a political science professor at Claremont McKenna College in California. "He can hardly complain that it's a nasty attack. After all, it's the highest honor that a presidential nominee can bestow. At the same time, it gets people thinking of him in a subordinate position."

Clinton's actions also are an act of political chutzpah rarely seen in presidential politics, as the New York Daily News columnist Michael Goodwin wrote on Monday: "It's a dream team all right, as in dream on. It's a fantasy because, in the Clintons' pitch, naturally, she is on top of the ticket and Obama is her No. 2 ... Forget those pesky voters - Hillary has declared herself the winner!"

Consequently, "Obama was wise to bat it down quickly," said Thomas Mann, a veteran political analyst at the Brookings Institution. "But, like the 3 a.m. ad, often times the initial message dominates the response," he added, referring to a Clinton TV ad that used a dramatized early morning crisis call to the White House to question Obama's qualifications to be commander in chief.

For nearly a week, since her surprise victories in the Texas and Ohio primaries, Clinton has been hinting that Obama would be an acceptable running mate for her. And over the weekend, while campaigning in Mississippi, her husband, former President Clinton, made a similar comment, arguing that his wife and Obama could form "an almost unstoppable force."

Similarly, Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell, a Clinton supporter, appearing on NBC's "Meet the Press" program on Sunday, said Clinton and Obama "would be a great ticket."

But former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle of South Dakota, an Obama backer, appearing on the same program, mocked the idea. "It may be the first time in history that the person who is running number two would offer the person running number one the number two position."

However, a poll released Monday by Newsweek showed that the vast majority of Democrats, 69 percent, support the idea of a "dream ticket" of Clinton and Obama. In its poll, however, the magazine did not ask which candidate Democrats want to top this ticket. Overall, the poll found that 45 percent of Democrats favor Obama as the nominee, 44 percent favor Clinton, a statistical dead heat.

The latest delegate count by The Associated Press shows Obama with 1,579 convention delegates compared to 1,473 for Clinton. To win the nomination, a candidate must have at least 2,025 delegates. With so few delegates still at stake in the primaries and caucuses, the candidates are vying for the support of the party's 796 superdelegates, the party leaders, elected officials and leading activists whose votes on the party nominee count as much as the delegates won in the primaries and caucuses.

Thirty-three delegates are at stake in Tuesday's primary in Mississippi, which Obama is expected to win, adding to his victory Saturday in Wyoming's caucus.