The New Nation - Internet Edition

AP, Washington

Strategists for the campaigns of Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton exchanged calculated barbs Sunday over accountability and ethics and who is engaging in personal attacks.

Obama communications director Robert Gibbs called on Clinton to release full post-White House tax returns; disclose all congressional "earmarks," or pet projects she had inserted into spending bills; and release all documents on the Clinton Foundation and Clinton Library, including a list of donors.

"What is lurking in those documents?" Gibbs asked as the two campaigns had dueling phone conference calls with reporters.

"There are gaps that need to be filled," said senior Obama strategist David Axelrod. "This is a tried and true technique of the Obama campaign that has repeatedly shifted negative when they find the momentum working against them," said senior Clinton strategist Mark Penn. He suggested the Obama campaign was trying to "deflect public opinion from their losses in Ohio and Texas" and faced with Clinton strength in Pennsylvania.

Obama was heading for Pennsylvania on Monday to campaign, with stops later in the week likely in North Carolina and Oregon. Clinton prepared to give a speech on the Iraq war on Monday in Washington. The Obama campaign's move on Clinton came after a weekend in which the Illinois Democrat sought to ease public concerns about his ties to an indicted Chicago developer and to inflammatory statements by his former pastor.

In interviews with Chicago newspapers, a TV appearance and a Saturday speech in Indiana, Obama disavowed racially tinged comments by Rev. Jeremiah Wright, who was Obama's pastor for nearly 20 years before retiring recently.

Obama also worked to distance himself from Antoin "Tony" Rezko, a former fundraiser for the candidate who is currently on trial in Chicago on corruption charges.

Obama's team asserted that Clinton was continuing to shield financial documents from public scrutiny at the same time she was calling for greater accountability.