Edwards adopts statesmanlike stance

St Louis, Missouri: With his rivals engaged in a high-profile feud, Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards tried to position himself on Friday as the more statesmanlike leader, saying the bickering between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama epitomised what was wrong with US politics.

"In the last four days we have two good people, Democratic candidates for president, who have spent their time attacking each other instead of attacking the problems this country faces," Edwards told the annual National Urban League convention, which also heard speeches from Clinton and Obama.

To the "oohs" that followed his remark, Edwards ad-libbed: "I got your attention with that one, didn't I?"

The attacks the former senator from North Carolina referred to were a series of edgy exchanges between Clinton and Obama and their aides over the proper way for a president to deal with hostile nations.

At a debate in South Carolina on Monday among all the eight Democratic White House contenders, Obama said that as president, he would readily meet with leaders of rogue nations in his first year in power.

Clinton challenged that answer on stage, saying underlings should first establish conditions for such negotiations. And on Tuesday, while campaigning in Iowa, she cast Obama's position as "naive".

Obama, in turn, described Clinton's foreign policy as taking a page from President Bush, calling it, "Bush-Cheney lite".

His address to the National Urban League, a leading civil rights group, represented Edwards' first effort to get some traction from the dispute.

Republican hopefuls to skip internet debate

Rudy Giuliani and Mitt Romney are skipping the CNN/YouTube debate of Republican presidential hopefuls in September, their campaigns said.

Romney formally dropped out of the September 17 debate in St. Petersburg, and a campaign aide said Giuliani is "unlikely to participate due to scheduling conflicts."

Only John McCain and Ron Paul have confirmed they will take part in the debate, sponsored by CNN, YouTube and the Florida Republican Party.

Some pundits speculated that Republicans may take a pass on the CNN debate the way Democrats skipped a Fox News debate earlier this year.

The absence of two of the top Republicans raises the question of whether the Republican version of the unconventional but popular forum will be rescheduled, or even scratched.