Obama drawing support
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. -- Democrat Barack Obama said Sunday his landslide win in South Carolina's presidential primary marks a turn in political history, showing a black candidate can appeal to voters of all colors and in all regions.
The senator told a raucous crowd of more than 9,000 here that his big victory Saturday disproved the old notion "that if you get black votes, you can't get white votes," and vice versa.
"We're going to write a new chapter in the South, we're going to write a new chapter in American history," he said during his 64-minute speech to a capacity crowd at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. The crowd was roughly two-thirds black.
Saturday's victory in South Carolina has given Obama's campaign new momentum.
Yet earlier Sunday he found himself having to answer comments by former President Clinton that some interpreted as an effort to diminish Obama's win Saturday over Hillary Rodham Clinton. Bill Clinton noted that Jesse Jackson won the South Carolina primary in 1984 and 1988. Jackson never became the party's presidential nominee.
Obama, speaking during a television interview, said "there's no doubt" that Jackson set a precedent for blacks seeking the presidency. But he noted that was two decades ago.
"I think that what we saw in this election was a shift in South Carolina," he said, with implications "all across the country. I think people want change. I think they want to get beyond some of the racial politics that, you know, has been so dominant in the past."
Obama resisted being drawn into a spat with the Clintons, even though he suggested they are part of a political past the country is ready to leave behind.
Obama would not answer questions about an endorsement from Kennedy.
"I'll let Ted Kennedy speak for himself. And nobody does it better," he said on ABC's "This Week." "But obviously, any of the Democratic candidates would love to have Ted Kennedy's support. And we have certainly actively sought it. And you know, I will let him make his announcement and his decision when he decides it's appropriate."
Kennedy's endorsement was highly sought after by all the Democratic candidates. Besides his status as a liberal icon and member of the Kennedy dynasty, Kennedy boasts a broad national fundraising and political network.
Kennedy is friendly with the Democratic candidates. Obama and Clinton both serve on the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, and Kennedy is chairman. Former Sen. John Edwards partnered with Kennedy on patients' rights legislation in 2001, and Kennedy was a key White House ally when President Clinton was in Office.
Kennedy's endorsement of Obama will follow that of his niece Caroline, who backed the Illinois senator on Saturday. In an editorial in The New York Times, she said Obama could inspire Americans in the same way her father, President Kennedy, did.
"I have never had a president who inspired me the way people tell me that my father inspired them," she wrote. "But for the first time, I believe I have found the man who could be that president -- not just for me, but for a new generation of Americans."
Another of Sen. Kennedy's nieces, former Maryland Lt. Gov. Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, issued a statement Sunday in support of Clinton. "I respect Caroline and Teddy's decision, but I have made a different choice," she said. "While I admire Senator Obama greatly, I have known Hillary Clinton for over 25 years and have seen firsthand how she gets results. As a woman, leader and person of deep convictions, I believe Hillary Clinton would make the best possible choice for president."