FLINT, Mich. – There is something reminiscent about the argument Senator Barack Obama is increasingly making to audiences these days as he works to persuade voters that he is the reliable candidate of change in the presidential race.
It was nearly a year ago when Mr. Obama began to vigorously – and, quite often, mockingly – chide his rival for trying to claim ownership of the “I’m-for-change” label. At the time, the criticism was directed at his rival for the Democratic nomination, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, who was suddenly shifting her argument from long-earned experience to fresh-faced change.
As Mr. Obama spoke to an audience here on Monday, he substituted Senator John McCain, his Republican opponent, in the very spot that he might have raised Mrs. Clinton’s name last fall. The tone of his voice, though, carried a familiar ring.
“They had been running on experience; now they’re trying to repackage themselves,” said Mr. Obama, wearing a can-you-believe-it look on his face. “We’ve been talking about the need to change this country for 19 months. I guess it must be working, because suddenly now John McCain is saying I’m for change too.”
After accompanying his two daughters to school in Chicago for their first day of fall classes, Mr. Obama arrived here in Michigan on Monday afternoon with an air of urgency to his task of winning over voters in this contested state. He drew sharp distinctions with Mr. McCain, referring to him by name more than in any recent day.
Mr. Obama warned voters to be skeptical in believing that Republicans would change Washington, considering that the party has controlled the White House for nearly eight years. “It’s just kind of hard to believe,” he said, adding, “I’m going to change us from us?”
On his third visit to Michigan in nine days, Mr. Obama told voters that his rival’s Straight Talk Express bus should be rebranded as “The No-change Express.” He also continued an argument that he started on Saturday in Indiana, questioning the evolving stance by the Republican vice-presidential nominee, Gov. Sarah Palin, on the so-called Bridge to Nowhere in Alaska.
“She was for it until everybody started raising a fuss about it and she started running for governor and then suddenly she was against it!” said Mr. Obama, speaking over an applauding crowd. “I mean you can’t just make stuff up. You can’t just recreate yourself. You can’t just reinvent yourself. The American people aren’t stupid.”
Tucker Bounds, a spokesman for the McCain-Palin campaign, disputed Mr. Obama’s assertion that he was the candidate who could best bring about change.
“It’s John McCain who has shown the experience and judgment to deliver change,” Mr. Bounds said in a statement. “Barack Obama has been rated by nonpartisan publications as the most liberal member of the U.S. Senate, so if he thinks that voters are going to believe his rhetoric on the campaign trail in the absence of any bipartisan record, he’s clearly underestimating the intelligence of the American people.”
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