50,000 cheer Obama in Oregon
Later he held a spectacular outdoor rally at a sun-splashed scene on the banks of the Willamette River in Portland, with more than 50,000 cheering backers. Organizers said 10,000 more were unable to get in, and dozens of boaters floated and listened from the river.
"In this whole campaign I don't think I've seen a scene so spectacular," said Obama. "We are tired of business as usual, and we are going to change America."
While more subdued, his appearance before about 130 people at an assisted living facility to talk Social Security was a significant attempt to tie the GOP's presidential nominee-in-waiting to an unpopular President Bush on a pocketbook issue that motivates seniors — and also concerns younger generations worried about their own future retirement.
"Let me be clear, privatizing Social Security was a bad idea when George W. Bush proposed it, it's a bad idea today," Obama said. "That's why I stood up against this plan in the Senate, and that's why I won't stand for it as president."
Obama said McCain would push to raise the retirement age for collecting Social Security benefits or trim annual cost-of-living increases. Obama has rejected both ideas as solutions to the funding crisis projected for Social Security in favor of making higher-income workers pay more into the system.
"We have to protect Social Security for future generations without pushing the burden onto seniors who have earned the right to retire in dignity," he said.
McCain spokesman Tucker Bounds accused Obama of making "misinformed partisan attacks."
"John McCain has been clear about his belief that we must fix Social Security for future generations and keep our promises to today's retirees, but raising taxes should not be the answer to every problem," Bound said.
It was a day of campaigning for the two Democrats still competing for the party's presidential nomination.
Obama was in Oregon, where he is favored to win the state's presidential primary on Tuesday. Hillary Rodham Clinton spent a second straight day in Kentucky, where she is favored to win when its voters head to the polls the same day.
She attended worship services at a Methodist church in Bowling Green, and happily sang hymns and joined in Bible readings. But her smile faded when the pastor launched into a sermon about adultery, asking his congregants whether the devil had ever whispered over their shoulders in their marriages.
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