Obama Focuses on Economic Issues

"For all his talk about independence, the centerpiece of John McCain's economic plan amounts to a full-throated endorsement of George Bush's policies"

RALEIGH, N.C. (MCT) - Sen. Barack Obama says he feels your pain.

With Americans stressed by $4-per-gallon gasoline and locked in a deeply depressed housing slump, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee launched a two-week tour Monday to focus on pocketbook issues.

Along the way, he will try to tie likely Republican nominee Sen. John McCain to the policies of an unpopular president.

"For all his talk about independence, the centerpiece of John McCain's economic plan amounts to a full-throated endorsement of George Bush's policies," Obama told an invitation-only audience of 900 at the North Carolina State Fairgrounds.

The Illinois Democrat's new emphasis comes after weeks of McCain focusing mostly on national security and foreign policy, areas where the GOP believes Obama is vulnerable because of his comparative lack of experience.

In an interview with "NBC Nightly News," McCain presented Obama as a spender who has "no way to pay for his programs."

After a weekend at home in Chicago, Obama's "Change that Works for You" tour is his first major campaign swing since the contentious Democratic nomination fight finally ended last week.

The Republican National Committee countered by calling it the "Change We Can't Afford" tour and pointed to Obama's support for increases in income, Social Security and capital gains taxes for higher-income Americans.

McCain also questioned Obama's appointment of James Johnson to his vice presidential search team, citing the executive's ties to sub-prime lender Countrywide Financial Corp.

"I think it suggests a bit of a contradiction talking about how his campaign is going to be not associated with people like that," the Arizona senator said in a FOX News interview. "Clearly he is very much associated with that."

Johnson, a former Fannie Mae CEO, received personal loans at preferential terms that were directed by Countrywide's CEO, according to a weekend report in the Wall Street Journal.

Obama's campaign responded by pointing to McCain's ties to lobbyists.

"It's the height of hypocrisy for the McCain campaign to try and make this an issue when John Green, one of John McCain's top advisers, lobbied for Ameriquest, which was one of the nation's largest sub-prime lenders and a key player in the mortgage crisis," spokesman Tommy Vietor said in a statement.

Throughout the economic tour, Obama is expected to meet with voters and visit workplaces ranging from hospitals to factories in traditional battleground states, including stops Wednesday and Thursday in Iowa and Wisconsin.

Aides said the tour is also likely to include additional efforts to present Obama as a regular guy, as was tried in the primary campaign with stops at beer halls, bowling alleys and basketball courts.

With former White House hopefuls John and Elizabeth Edwards in attendance for part of the speech here, Obama charged that the Bush administration's tax cuts have hurt the nation's infrastructure - and progress.

"For eight long years, our president sacrificed investments in health care, and education, and energy, and infrastructure on the altar of tax breaks for big corporations and wealthy CEOs - trillions of dollars in giveaways that proved neither compassionate nor conservative," he said.

Obama made specific mention of Elizabeth Edwards, who abstained from endorsing him when her husband did last month, as he talked about health care reform.

"I'm going to be partnering up with Elizabeth Edwards," he said. "We're going to be figuring all this out."

Although the electoral map has been relatively stable in the past two presidential elections, Obama's campaign believes it can use its money and organizational strength to compete in more states, including North Carolina.

Deputy campaign manager Steve Hildebrand sent out a fundraising solicitation Monday that Obama's campaign would "deploy and maintain staff in every single state."

By moving into some previously dependable Republican states, Obama hopes to force McCain to spend precious resources defending turf, thus draining him of money to fight in more traditional battlegrounds like Ohio.

By starting the economic pitch in North Carolina, Obama's campaign signaled just how interested it is in trying to win a state that has not voted for a Democratic candidate for president since Jimmy Carter in 1976.

The state has a sizable African-American population and Obama's aides believes that, plus a growing non-native white vote, could turn the state from red to blue.

Obama offered no new policy proposals, but instead stressed his differences with McCain, including his willingness to raise taxes on the wealthiest Americans, while cutting taxes for many others. He also called for greater government investment in education and alternative energy.

In a conference call with reporters that included the introduction of Brookings Institution economist Jason Furman as a new adviser, Obama's campaign said it is prepared to defend against Republican charges that he is a tax-and-spend liberal.

"He's going to cut taxes for 95 percent of workers and their families," said Austan Goolsbee, another Obama economic adviser. "I think the charge is in accurate."

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Obama ended the day in Missouri, which last voted for a Democrat in 1996. With the exception of 1956, the bellwether state has picked every presidential winner since 1900, and Obama has pledged to spend considerable time there.

As Obama headlined a St. Louis fundraiser, McCain responded with an effort toward openness, matching a months-old Obama practice that allows the media to monitor his fundraisers held in public places like hotels.

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(Chicago Tribune correspondent Mark Silva contributed to this report from Washington.)

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(c) 2007, Chicago Tribune. Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.