Analysis: Obama wants voters to remember Clinton’s past

(Via Yahoo! News.)

Remember the cookies?

Barack Obama wants to make sure that voters do, even if it was 16 years ago that Hillary Rodham Clinton created an uproar when she sniffed that she could have given up her career and “stayed home, baked cookies and had teas.”

While Clinton brought up the problems Obama could face in a general election if he’s nominated, Obama used a two-hour debate Wednesday night to remind Americans what they don’t like about his opponent and her husband, Bill, the former president. Both candidates argued they were tough enough to withstand whatever Republicans try to use against them.

Obama raised President Clinton’s controversial pardons on his last day in office. And he wanted Americans to know that Hillary Clinton repeatedly called him names in the past few days.

The point was to tie Clinton to the divisive politics of the past at a time when a new poll shows that a majority of voters view her as dishonest. The loss of voters’ trust comes as Clinton has been attacking Obama for comments he made recently about Pennsylvania voters who “cling to guns or religion” because they are “bitter” about the economy — statements that he maintains he mangled.

“During the course of the last few days, you know, she’s said I’m elitist, out of touch, condescending,” Obama said.

“You take one person’s statement, if it’s not properly phrased, and you just beat it to death,” he added. “And that’s what Senator Clinton’s been doing over the last four days.”

Full story here.