Transcript of Obama’s Interview on “NewsHour”

SEN. OBAMA: You know, I’m not sure if it was inevitable. I think that there’s no doubt that race and gender are powerful forces in our society. They always have been. And I think it would have been naïve for me to think that I could run and end up with quasi-frontrunner status in a presidential election as potentially the first African-American president that issues, race wouldn’t come up any more than Senator Clinton could expect that gender issues might not come up.

But, ultimately, I don’t think it’s useful. I think we’ve got to talk about it. I think we’ve got to process it. But we’ve got to remind ourselves that what we have in common is far more important than what’s different and that if we’re going to solve any of these problems, we’ve got to come together and bridge our differences in ways that we just have not bridged them before.

MS. IFILL: Is that the speech you’ll be giving tomorrow in Philadelphia?

SEN. OBAMA: That will be a major focus of it.

MS. IFILL: You have also cast this as a generational distinction of the sort of things that Reverend Wright said being the baggage of a fiercely intelligent African-American man of his generation and Geraldine Ferraro’s as well. When does one person’s baggage become another person’s memory/history?

SEN. OBAMA: Well, you know, look, there’s a continuum. But I think that, you know, when you look at somebody like a Reverend Wright who grew up in the ’50s or ’60s, his experience of race in this country is very different than mine in the same way that Geraldine’s experience being an intelligent, ambitious woman, you know, is very different than a young woman who’s coming up today and potentially has a different set of opportunities.

Now, we benefit from that past. We benefit from the difficult battles that were taken place. But I’m not sure that we benefit from continuing to perpetuate the anger and the bitterness that I think, at this point, serves to divide rather than bring us together. And that’s part of what this campaign has been about, is to say, let’s acknowledge a difficult history, but let’s move forward in a practical way to get things done.

MS. IFILL: Has this been damaging to your campaign?

SEN. OBAMA: You know, the – I would say that it has been a distraction from the core message of our campaign. I think part of what has always been the essence of my politics, not just this campaign, but my life is the idea that we’ve got to bring people together. Now, part of that is biographical as somebody who comes from a diverse background with a white mother and an African-American father growing up in Hawaii and Asia. You know, it’s in my DNA to believe that all of us have something fundamental in common.

The Page – by Mark Halperin – TIME

Obama laughs at [Clinton’s] contention.

“We were told that these contests would not count,” he tells Steve Inskeep. “Sen. Clinton agreed. Our name was taken off the ballot in Michigan, and in Florida we did no campaigning. Now, if people think that that is a normal democratic way of running an election, then that’s not the America that I know.” …

“Look, we’re going to abide by whatever the Democratic National Committee determines is fair,” he says. “But the important point is … that we agreed not to participate in this process. Not just me, but Sen. Clinton did as well. If you ask my 6-year-old, should that election count, she would probably be able to figure out that that’s not fair.”

NPR: Obama: Michigan, Florida Do-Overs ‘Not Realistic’

Hillary Clinton says the results of Michigan’s Democratic presidential primary should count, even if Barack Obama’s name did not appear on the ballot.

“That was his choice,” she says in an interview with Steve Inskeep. “There was no rule or requirement that he take his name off the ballot. His supporters ran a very aggressive campaign to try to get people to vote uncommitted.” [mjh: It’s very important to remember that Obama supporters pushed for ‘uncommitted’ specifically in response to Clinton’s campaign in Michigan, against the terms all had mutually agreed to.]

The states of Florida and Michigan were stripped of their delegates when they defied the rules of the national Democratic Party and moved up the date of their primaries. Clinton remained on the ballot in both states, while Obama stayed on only the Florida ballot.

Neither candidate was supposed to campaign, in accordance with the Democratic National Party’s wishes.

NPR: Clinton Says Michigan and Florida Should Count

Senator John McCain loves to present himself as a fighter against waste and pork-barrel spending. … But his jabs at a study of grizzly bears in Montana are way off the mark.

To hear Mr. McCain tell it in his presidential stump speech and campaign ads, the government has squandered $3 million (actually more like $5 million) to study the DNA of bears in Montana. “I don’t know if it was a paternity issue or criminal,” he jokes, “but it was a waste of money.”

A report by Joel Achenbach in The Washington Post makes clear, however, that this was not really a study of bear DNA but a study that used bear DNA to determine whether the grizzly bear was still a threatened species or had rebounded. Mr. McCain and his staff either failed to realize that or chose to distort the facts for political effect. Either choice is not encouraging.

The intent of the study, whose results have not yet been published, is to estimate the size and makeup of the grizzly bear population in a vast region, encompassing Glacier National Park, five wilderness areas, parts of five national forests and other public and private lands in a largely roadless, mountainous terrain. Scientists collected hairs snagged by strategically placed barbed wire to extract DNA that could identify how many bears had passed by, their gender and unique identity. Statistical models could then predict the total population.

That is hardly frivolous. It is a prerequisite for sensible administration of the Endangered Species Act.

The presumed Republican presidential nominee also fails to mention that the project was sponsored by Conrad Burns, a former Republican senator from Montana who chairs the McCain campaign in that state. Mr. McCain never explains why, if it was such a waste, he didn’t try to curtail it on the Senate floor.

It is a longstanding practice on Capitol Hill for legislators to lampoon research projects that can be made to sound foolish. Some may well be. If Mr. McCain wants to make serious critiques of research spending — and keep his reputation as a credible opponent of government waste — he and his staff need to be more careful and a lot more science-literate.

McCain Misfires at Grizzlies – New York Times