GOP cites Obama's lack of experience as key detractor

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By Tom Saul | Monday, August 25, 2008 9:46 PM CDT | () comments

As presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama spoke at the Mississippi Valley Fairgrounds on Monday, across Locust Street former Davenport mayor and Scott County board chairman Ed Winborn stood with others holding John McCain signs.

Winborn said he is a McCain backer, mainly because he believes the Arizona Republican is best suited to end the Iraq war in a way that is in the best interest of the country and its troops.

“I think he just has the life experience and the experience in Vietnam that will make him better suited to be president,” said Winborn, whose son is on his fourth tour of duty with special forces in Iraq. “I don’t think Obama has that experience. He doesn’t have experience in a lot of areas.”

The group of about 12 who stood at the curb waving McCain signs drew honks, whistles and thumbs-up signals from passing vehicles as, just a few hundred yards away, Obama laced into his Republican challenger on such things as the economy, the war, health care and his record of voting with President Bush.

Paul Janecek, vice chairman of the Scott County Republican Party, said he was nowhere near Obama’s invitation-only, picnic-style gathering at tables under shade trees at the fairgrounds where about 180 guests were surrounded on two sides by hordes of news reporters and photographers.

But, Janecek said, he has had difficulty trying to understand why Democrats have selected Obama as their presumptive nominee when they had so many other better qualified candidates to choose from. For instance, he said, Sen. Hillary Clinton of New York is far better qualified to be president.

“Obama scammed them with clever sound bites and made them feel good, but I’m not convinced that he’s capable of running the country,” Janecek said. “He’s ambitious and he’s a new face, but I would be really, really worried if he is elected president. He doesn’t have enough experience to be his own man.”

McCain’s Iowa campaign also criticized Obama’s lack of experience and his proposals on such things as “job-killing tax increases during a down economy” and a “one-size fits all” health care plan that merely shifts who pays without fixing the problem, it said in a statement.

“Obama will lose in Iowa for the same reasons he is going to lose in the general election,” the statement said. “The more Iowa voters learn about Sen. Obama’s lack of experience, the partisan voting record and his willingness to talk to the world’s worst dictators, the more they appreciate John McCain’s experience, judgment and long history of working across the aisle to bring change.”

Tom Saul can be contacted at

(563) 383-2453 or tsaul@qctimes.com.