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Obama visits 3 Phila.-area counties

On his only day in Pennsylvania this week, Sen. Barack Obama made stops in three suburban counties, holding town-hall meetings in Bucks and Chester and doing a little shopping at a grocery store in Montgomery.

At Truman High in Levittown, Kyle Esposito, 14 (left), and Zach Carper, 17, were among those who heard Obama at a town hall. Slide shows and more online at http:// go.philly.com/paprimary
At Truman High in Levittown, Kyle Esposito, 14 (left), and Zach Carper, 17, were among those who heard Obama at a town hall. Slide shows and more online at http:// go.philly.com/paprimaryRead moreELIZABETH ROBERTSON / Inquirer Staff Photographer

On his only day in Pennsylvania this week, Sen. Barack Obama made stops in three suburban counties, holding town-hall meetings in Bucks and Chester and doing a little shopping at a grocery store in Montgomery.

At his first event, at Great Valley High School in Malvern, the Democratic presidential candidate set the tone for the day.

There, Obama painted a bleak picture of the U.S. economy - "a story of empty factories that used to be the economic engines of entire towns, shut down forever . . . mothers who can't sleep at night because their children are sick . . . fathers who can't find work, can't figure out how to pay the mortgage."

And he had harsh words for Sen. John McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee, saying McCain was willing to "sit idly by" in the face of a national housing crisis.

"It's time to end the Bush-Cheney-McCain policy that tells the American people 'you're on your own,' because we're all in this together," Obama said.

The Republican National Committee responded in a statement that Obama was misrepresenting McCain in a way that "totally contradicts his claim to represent a new brand of politics."

Later, at a town-hall meeting at Truman High School in Levittown, Obama was asked about an award given to Louis Farrakhan, head of the Nation of Islam, by a magazine run by the daughter of Obama's former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr. The questioner referred to Farrakhan as "an anti-Semitic demagogue."

Obama said he would not have given Farrakhan such an award, even though, he said, the honor cited Farrakhan's community-rehabilitation work.

"Nobody has spoken out more fiercely on the issue of anti-Semitism than I have," Obama said. "I haven't just started doing it lately, which is one reason why I have such strong support in the Jewish community in Chicago."

The questioner, Janet Cooper, 54, an art-gallery owner from Margate, N.J., said that answer did not allay her fears. "But I thought it was a good answer, a hopeful answer," said Cooper, a supporter of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton who said she would back Obama if he became the Democratic nominee.

At a ShopRite supermarket in East Norriton Township, the candidate caused a near riot as he made his for-the-cameras walk through the aisles. One woman shouted, "Obama, please touch my hand, I love you," and another asked that he sign her hand. He complied with both requests.

Along the way, he picked up a few Gala apples, a bag of cheese puffs, a bottle of water, and a box of Butterscotch Krimpets. He paid for it all with cash out of his own pocket, $9.40.

On another front, Obama was criticized by Clinton's aides for a television commercial in which he says he does not take money from oil companies. As Clinton's supporters pointed out, corporate contributions are illegal, and Obama has taken some money from oil executives.

"This is yet another example of where Sen. Obama's words don't match his actions," state Democratic Party chairman T.J. Rooney said.

Replied Obama spokeswoman Jen Psaki: "The fact is, Barack Obama takes no money from Washington lobbyists or PACs, while Sen. Clinton has taken more than any Democrat or Republican in the race, and that includes oil companies."

After the town-hall meeting in Levittown, Obama left for a three-day bus tour of Indiana, which has its primary May 6. He is expected to return to Pennsylvania on Sunday, when there will be nine days left before the vote April 22.