Obama gets it exactly right:
At a morning press conference, though, Obama indicated that the race wasn’t as nasty as some may think, "I don't feel like the candidates are being blooded up," but then added on, "This is good practice for me, so ya know when I take on those Republicans I'll be accustomed to it."
The lead in to the quote, however, seems a bit off to me. I don't think Obama was implying that the attacks are nothing compared to what he can expect from Republicans so much as he was suggesting that Hillary is behaving just like the Republicans. To explain, I think I'll just quote something I said yesterday:
Hillary has spent the few weeks implying that only she can stand up to what the Republicans will inevitably throw at her. She survived 16 years of their bullshit, so she can surely survive 8 more. Obama, by implication, is too weak to take the full force of their attack. Except... by launching these sorts of attacks at him, she's providing a perfect opportunity for him to rebut what has become one of the key arguments for her campaign.
Think on it: If she can survive and win because she knows how to fight back, what will it say about Obama if he can survive her attacks? If she's good enough to beat the Republicans, and he is good enough to beat her, well.... remind me why we should vote for her again?
Her argument is that only she can stand up to Republican attacks. But if he is able to equate her attacks with theirs, that advantage not only goes away, it transfers to him. I don't think he's trying to play her attacks down. If anything, I think he's trying to play them up.
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