Obama Endorsed by Anti-War Group

LOS ANGELES -- Barack Obama picked up the endorsement of a leading anti-war group Friday and said Democratic presidential rival Hillary Rodham Clinton still has not adequately explained her vote to go into Iraq.

Obama told reporters in a news conference that, even though Clinton explains how she would like to end the war, her explanation for her vote leading into the war is disingenuous. He said his opposition against the war from the start will make him the stronger rival to Republican front-runner and war backer John McCain in the general election.

Obama's long-standing opposition to the war helped him pick up the backing of MoveOn.org, a liberal network which counts 3.2 million members and decided to support him by a vote of 70 percent to 30 percent for Clinton. The group said Friday that it has 1.7 million members in the 22 states scheduled to vote in the race Tuesday, and it would immediately begin a campaign to get them behind Obama.

Obama also picked up the support of a large union in California which had endorsed rival John Edwards, who dropped out of the race this week.

Meanwhile, Oprah Winfrey was returning to the campaign trail in support of her friend Obama. The talk show hostess planned to hold a rally with Obama's wife, Michelle, and Caroline Kennedy on Sunday in Los Angeles. Winfrey held massive rallies for Obama in December in the early voting states of Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina.

MoveOn.org executive director Eli Pariser said the country needs a president to end the war, provide universal health care, address climate change, restore America's standing in the world and "change business as usual in Washington." In his statement, Pariser thanked all the other candidates who ran in the Democratic primary for their contributions to the race.

Obama criticized Clinton's answer during a debate Thursday night when she was asked why she voted against a 2002 amendment offered by Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich. The amendment would have given weapons inspectors more time in Iraq and required President Bush to first obtain U.N. approval before using force. Clinton argued that a vote for the Levin amendment would have subordinated U.S. authority in Iraq to the U.N. Security Council and called it a troublesome precedent.

She reiterated her explanation of the 2002 vote to give Bush authority to use military force to oust Saddam Hussein. But she added, "If I had known then what I know now, I never would have given President Bush the authority. It was a sincere vote based on my assessment at the time and what I believed he would do with the authority he was given. He abused that authority; he misused that authority."

She declined to say the vote was a mistake. Obama criticized her explanation in his news conference, the third he's held this week leading into the Super Tuesday contests. Clinton holds a lead in the polling in most of those states.

"I think there continues to be a suggestion that it was not a vote for war, and I thought that her explanation with respect to the Levin amendment was inaccurate," Obama said. "Anyone who looks at the Levin amendment knows that we were not ceding sovereignty in some fashion to the United Nations."

Responding to Obama Friday, Clinton spokesman Phil Singer said Obama's early opposition to the war was not borne out by his actions in the Senate.

"The reality is that once he got sworn in, he explicitly called for keeping troops in Iraq and opposed a timeline for withdrawal, only changing his position when he became a candidate for the White House," Singer said.