KANSAS City, Mo. (MCT) – Amid the ghosts of World War I Monday, Sen. John McCain raised the… KANSAS City, Mo. (MCT) – Amid the ghosts of World War I Monday, Sen. John McCain raised the specter of a reinvasion of Iraq.

The “hasty, reckless and irresponsible withdrawal” proposed by his Democratic rivals will have dire consequences, he warned.

Backing out now would trigger massive unrest that would require the U.S. to storm back into the country to restore order, the Arizona Republican predicted to an audience of veterans at the National World War I Museum in Kansas City.

He blasted senators Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton for a “failure of leadership.”

“To promise a withdrawal of our forces from Iraq, regardless of the calamitous consequences to the Iraqi people, our most vital interests, and the future of the Middle East, is the height of irresponsibility,” McCain said.

Obama quickly returned the volley using some of McCain’s own words, calling it “a failure of leadership to support an open-ended occupation of Iraq that has failed to press Iraq’s leaders to reconcile.”

The U.S. military is now badly overstretched and the American people “less safe,” said Obama, an Illinois Democrat.

Clinton said the senator’s “Groundhog Day approach” to Iraq “means four more years of the Bush-Cheney-McCain policy of continuing to police a civil war while the threats to our national security, our economy, and our standing in the world mount.

“We simply cannot give the Iraqi government an endless blank check,” the New York Democrat said. “It is time to end this war as quickly, as responsibly, and as safely as possible.”

McCain insisted that the Democrats’ approach was tantamount to placing politics before the national interest. -By Steve Kraske McClatchy Newspapers

PHILADELPHIA (MCT)– In his courtship of Pennsylvania voters during his bus tour, Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama had a wingman: Sen. Bob Casey Jr.

They hung out in a bowling alley and a sports bar. They spent hours on Obama’s campaign bus, slammed into each other on the basketball court, and teased each other like brothers. They demonstrated such an affection that some members of the traveling party labeled them BFF, the text-message abbreviation for “best friends forever.”

It was a noisy debut on the national political stage for Casey, who spent his first year in the U.S. Senate in relative obscurity.

But he stunned many in the state March 28, when he endorsed Obama after repeatedly vowing to remain neutral in the battle between the Illinois senator and Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York, who has the support of most of the state’s Democratic leaders.

And it could not have come at a better moment for Obama, who has been trailing Clinton by double-digit margins in most state polls. Casey, scion of a Scranton political dynasty, is influential with white working-class voters.

Those voters, it happens, have been the most resistant to Obama’s candidacy in other states, and strategists sizing up Pennsylvania’s April 22 primary say the working class holds the key here. Obama aides were hopeful that Casey could help them peel away some Clinton support among the group.

“Casey polls off the charts in Northeast Pennsylvania,” said Mike Washo, a Lackawanna County commissioner. “His support gives credibility, an impetus for some people to consider supporting Obama.”

For Casey, endorsing Obama is a no-lose proposition, analysts say: If Obama gets crushed, that won’t be seen as Casey’s fault. If Obama does better than expected, he is bound to get some credit.

The alliance also could help Casey with black, upper-income voters, and college students, broadening his base for reelection or another try for governor some day.

If Obama were to win the White House, Casey would become the most prominent of the new president’s “go-to” political people for Pennsylvania, others said.

“The White House doors will be open and Casey’s phone calls will be answered,” said Jack Hanna, an Obama supporter from Indiana, Pa., who heads the Southwest Caucus of the Democratic State Committee.

On the other hand, if Clinton wins the presidency, Gov. Ed Rendell would be first in line. A crowded lineup backs Clinton, including Mayor Nutter, Pittsburgh Mayor Luke Ravenstahl, Allegheny County Executive Dan Onorato, and Lehigh County Executive Don Cunningham. -By Thomas Fitzgerald The Philadelphia Inquirer

(U-WIRE) PHILADELPHIA – In his fifth run for president, public interest activist Ralph Nader spoke at the Constitution Center about the current state of politics.

“One of these days, the American people will say enough is enough,” he said.

Nader called the neck-and-neck campaigns between Sens. Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama as “the same old rhetoric” and said the candidates consistently say one thing and do another.

During the press conference Saturday evening, the independent presidential candidate called the current state of politics in Pennsylvania as “William Penn’s worst nightmare.”

“[There is] sleaze and corruption people of Pennsylvania have to confront because they are paying the price of being defenseless against the activities of democrats and republicans,” he said.

He also condemned the war in Iraq. If elected, Nader said he would reduce the military budget and try to return what the government has “stolen” from Iraq and made taxpayers pay.

With the ever-rising cost of college tuition, Nader said he condemned the increasing amount of student loans coming from corporations instead of the Department of Education.

He pointed out that the United States is the only Western country that charges students as much as it does for college tuition.

“We should have a system where students have higher education access without mortgaging their futures,” he said. -By Morgan A. Zalot Temple News (Temple U.)