The picture, sent to the Drudge Report website, shows Mr Obama wearing traditional African dress during a visit to Kenya in 2006.
The Obama camp said it was circulated by Mrs Clinton's staff as a smear. Mrs Clinton's team denied the accusation.
The row comes as the rivals campaign for two crucial primaries next week.
Analysts say Mrs Clinton needs to win the contests, in Texas and Ohio, to remain in the race to choose the Democratic candidate for November's presidential election.
'Fear-mongering'
The photograph shows Mr Obama - whose father came from Kenya - wearing a white turban and a white robe presented to him by elders in the north-east of the country.
| | Her campaign has engaged in the most shameful, offensive fear-mongering we've seen from either party in this election David Plouffe, Obama campaign chief, accusing the Clinton camp |
Some Clinton aides have tried in the past to suggest to Democrats that Barack Obama's background might be off-putting to mainstream voters.
A campaign volunteer was sacked last year after circulating an email suggesting, falsely, that Mr Obama was a Muslim.
But the BBC Justin Webb in Ohio says the photograph - coming at this pivotal moment in the campaign - is being seen by the Obama team as particularly offensive.
His campaign manager, David Plouffe, accused Mrs Clinton's aides of "the most shameful, offensive fear-mongering we've seen from either party in this election".
The accusation was dismissed by Mrs Clinton's campaign manager Maggie Williams.
"If Barack Obama's campaign wants to suggest that a photo of him wearing traditional Somali clothing is divisive, they should be ashamed," she said.
"Hillary Clinton has worn the traditional clothing of countries she has visited and had those photos published widely."
Mrs Williams did not address the question of whether staffers circulated the photo.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/americas/7263783.stm
Yay, another piece of crap already. Maybe next it will be a picture of Obama shaking hands with Osama bin Laden or smoking hash with Saddam Hussein (one whose name he shares and one whose name is really pretty similar sounding). Maybe it is nothing, and maybe Americans won't even bat an eye that a the black, son of a Kenyan immigrant whose names are Muslim in origin was wearing traditional style Somali clothing ( a country where 16 American marines died in a failed peace keeping mission) in a photo. Maybe...I hope.
2 comments:
Yup. I think this is somewhere around a 4.5 on the meter of limp dicked political jackassery. I can't possibly rate it any higher because the actual effort involved was almost nil... no more complicated than attaching a photo to an email.
Even worse, I don't really find the photo to be particularly embarassing or image shattering... so I'm not sure what the brouhaha is all about.
I'm waiting for the cross-dressing photos to come out. Though I'm unsure as to whether that would help or hurt him vs. Hillary. :)
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