Stephanie Tubbs Jones slaps down Obama MLK criticism

http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2008/01/29/619627.aspx

HIGHLAND HILLS, OH -- "In the wake of criticism that his involvement in the presidential race has hurt his wife's campaign, President Bill Clinton campaigned in Ohio tonight with a message refocused on his wife's decision-making experience. Although the back-and-forth between Hillary Clinton and her main rival did not creep into the former president's remarks, the issue of race came up before Clinton even took the stage. He was introduced by Clinton endorser and popular local black representative Stephanie Tubbs Jones, who told a cheering and racially diverse crowd that Martin Luther King would have been proud of Clinton's candidacy.

"I am supporting Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, and I owe Martin Luther King Jr. too," said Tubbs Jones, a African-American congresswoman popular in her Cleveland-area district here. "Martin Luther King said 'Judge, you, by the content of your character, and not by the color of your skin.' And if he was here, and if he was here, he would say 'I'm happy that there's a woman running for president too.'"

She went on to take a swipe at Obama's focus on hope as the centerpiece of his candidacy. "You need to know hope did not begin in 2008," she said. "Hope began in 2002 when the man from Hope, Arkansas, ran for president and made a difference in the United States of America." (She meant 1992, when Clinton first began his presidential bid. The slip, perhaps, provides some evidence of the fieriness of her comments.)

When the time came for his own remarks, Clinton stayed away from the contentious issues that have dominated chatter about the race since the run up to South Carolina. Outlining his wife's strategies to tackle education, the economy, and trade, Clinton emphasized she has "the broadest, deepest record" of the three candidates still in the race".

When is their primary/caucus? Any poll data?