Obama leads Clinton in recent Iowa polls

After dropping in Iowa polls somewhat, Senator Hillary Clinton attacks Barack Obama suggesting that he he lacked her ability and experience to manage the economy.

Barack Obama, who was also campaigning in Iowa, pushed back swiftly and with humor, saying he did not know exactly what experiences she's claiming and pointing out that she herself had never held a prestigious job like, say, Treasury Secretary.

Both candidates seized on and elevated the economy as a major new sparring point reflecting the mounting concerns among Americans, not to mention Democratic primary voters, about employment, mortgage foreclosures, and rising oil, gas and energy bills.

Clinton and Obama, along with former Senator John Edwards, are bunched closely together in public opinion polls of likely Iowa caucus-goers, with each of the three searching for significant issues and a clear message to break ahead of the Democratic pack.

Hillary Clinton has outlined her major economic proposals in past speeches, including ideas to create 5 million new jobs through energy research and aid Americans facing mortgage foreclosures. Her thrust today was that the American economy has been damaged with deficits, tax cuts for wealthy Americans, and other choices by the Bush administration, and that the country needed an experienced fiscal steward in its next president.

Mrs. Clinton also made a glancing hit on the push by Mr. Obama, Mr. Edwards, and others to undertake a major overhaul of Social Security, which, Mrs. Clinton has asserted, they would pursue by raising taxes at a trillion-dollar level. Mrs. Clinton has called for publicly nominating a bipartisan commission to study the common issue.

Clinton compared Barack Obama's experience as on-the-job training and one job that American's can't afford.

Obama leads Clinton in recent Iowa polls

Hillary Clinton strikes Barack Obama over economy issues after Obama takes Democratic lead in recent Iowa polls.