WASHINGTON (AFP) — White House hopeful Hillary Clinton traded vicious barbs with her Democratic rival Barack Obama on Friday as they rode guns blazing into the final weekend before Pennsylvania's key primary.
Their bitter battle for the Democratic Party's nomination to run in the November elections has turned increasingly nasty since they faced off Wednesday in a lackluster debate.
Obama has lashed out at the format of the debate on ABC television, after he was put on the defensive over his fiery former pastor, comments that some working Americans were "bitter" and his reluctance to wear a US flag lapel pin.
But Clinton retorted Friday: "I've been through, what 23 of these debates? And as I recall I was asked some pretty tough questions in nearly every one of them. That goes with the territory.
"We need a president who is going to be up there fighting every day for the American people and not complain about how much pressure there is and how hard the questions are," she sniped.
Furious Obama campaign staff shot right back, accusing the former first lady of hypocrisy as she and her husband, former president Bill Clinton, have both complained of media bias in past months.
"Considering the fact that Senator Clinton sat on stage at the last debate and complained to all America that she always gets the first question, her blatant hypocrisy here is stunning," said Obama spokesman Bill Burton.
Obama won a boost Friday when former senators Sam Nunn and David Boren, both all-important superdelegates to the party's August convention, announced they were joining his campaign as advisers.
Robert Reich, who served as labor secretary under former president Clinton, also announced he was backing the Illinois senator, saying "he offers the best possibility of restoring America's moral authority in the world."
Going into Tuesday's pivotal vote, Obama has a slight advantage over Clinton in the overall race, in both the number of states he has won and the number of pledged delegates and superdelegates to the August convention.
According to independent pollsters RealClearPolitics.com, Obama has a total of 1,648 delegates to Clinton's 1,507.
With both unlikely to reach the 2,025 delegates needed to secure the party's nomination in the primaries, the preferences of the 795 superdelegates, mostly party luminaries, has become crucial.
Clinton leads in the superdelegate count, but about 250 have not yet announced who they will support.
With Republican Party presumptive nominee John McCain already campaigning hard, there is a glaring need for closure in the Democratic contest as national polls predict a tight November race.
A big victory in Pennsylvania could win over more superdelegates for Clinton, on a quest to become the country's first female president, and further tighten the race.
But, as both Democratic hopefuls were on the campaign trail in Pennsylvania on Friday, polls showed Clinton holding a vulnerable six-point lead.
That would fall short of the knock-out she needs to dent Obama's delegate lead, ahead of the next primaries in Indiana and North Carolina on May 6.
"Anything less than a double-digit victory could solidify the perception that Illinois Senator Barack Obama is the inevitable Democratic nominee, sparking a flow of superdelegates to his side," the Wall Street Journal said.
A poll published Friday in USA Today said dozens of uncommitted superdelegates would not be swayed by Tuesday's results.
"Pennsylvania matters. But so do the other states that have voted or intend to vote over the next two months," Donna Brazile, a member of the Democratic National Convention, told the daily.
Yet Oregon Secretary of State Bill Bradbury said Pennsylvania "could be the final call," adding that a strong showing there by Obama -- who is seeking to become the first African-American elected to the Oval Office -- could end doubts over his ability to appeal to white, working-class voters.
McCain meanwhile released his tax filings for the last two years. In addition to his 162,000 dollar annual salary as a senator, in 2007 he received 23,000 dollars in social security payments and a 58,000 dollar navy pension.
But the Arizona senator did not release the tax returns of his wife, Cindy, the heiress of a beer distributor worth an estimated tens of millions of dollars.
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