Clinton: Obama gave the "the old wink-wink" to Canadian officials regarding NAFTA

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http://www.swamppolitics.com/news/politics/blog/2008/03/clinton_obama_gave_canada_wink.html

TOLEDO, OH -- Hillary Clinton -- fighting to hold a slim lead in Ohio -- is seizing on a leaked memo indicating that a top Barack Obama adviser assured Canadian officials the candidate's attacks on NAFTA were motivated by primary politics.

The former first lady -- ratcheting up her battle with the press -- suggested the Canada story would be getting more attention if the memo had referred to her campaign's activities.

Speaking to reporters here this morning, Clinton said, "If you come to Ohio and you go give speeches that are very critical of NAFTA... and then we find out that your chief economic adviser has gone to a foreign government and basically done the old wink-wink – 'Don’t pay any attention, this is just political rhetoric' -- I think that raises serious questions."

Peering at the 50 or so reporters packed into a small hotel conference room here, she added: "I would ask you to look at this story and substitute my name for Sen. Obama’s name and see what you would do with this story… Just ask yourself (what you would do) if some of my advisers had been having private meetings with foreign governments."

The memo, written by a Canadian embassy official and leaked to the AP, claims that the campaign's top economic adviser Austan Goolsbee assured him that Obama's anti-NAFTA remarks "should not be taken out of context and should be viewed as more about political positioning than a clear articulation of policy plans."

Goolsbee has denied that he made the comments attributed to him.

Harper meddling in U.S. primaries, Democrats say

Two years after U.S. Ambassador David Wilkins was accused of meddling in Canada's federal election, the same is being said of Stephen Harper's Conservatives with respect to the current U.S. contest.

Democrats appearing on a nationwide U.S. political program accused the Harper government yesterday of interfering in the primary campaigns to help the Republican Party candidate in the coming campaign.

"You've got a right-wing government in Canada that is trying to help the Republicans and is out there actively interfering in this campaign," Bob Shrum told the popular program, Meet the Press. Mr. Shrum is a top-level Democrat adviser who has had key roles in the presidential campaigns of Al Gore and John Kerry.

At issue are reports that members of Mr. Harper's prime ministerial office leaked word last week that a member of Barack Obama's campaign told a Canadian diplomat that Mr. Obama was not serious when he raised the possibility of renegotiating the free-trade agreement.

That statement has become fodder for Mr. Obama's opponents, who have accused the Illinois senator of saying one thing to win votes in hard-pressed states such as Ohio, and another to keep the peace with the Canadian government.

http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20080227/dems_nafta_080227/20080227

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Late Wednesday, a spokesperson for the Obama campaign said the staff member's warning to Wilson sounded implausible, but did not deny that contact had been made.

"Senator Obama does not make promises he doesn't intend to keep," the spokesperson said.

Low-level sources also suggested the Clinton campaign may have given a similar warning to Ottawa, but a Clinton spokesperson flatly denied the claim.