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MAUREEN DOWD RIPS OBAMA: 'HE LOOKED AS IF HE NEEDED A SMOKE AND HE NEEDED IT BAD'
Tue Feb 13 2007 22:32:06 ET

NY TIMES edit queen Maureen Dowd unloads on Barack Obama in her Wednesday filing.

On the trail in Iowa, Dowd writes: "Obama's so slender his wedding band looked as if it was slipping off... there was a wariness in his dark eyes."

When a reporter asked him Obama whether he'd had a heater in his podium during his announcement speech in subzero Springfield, Obama hesitated.

Dowd slings: "He shot a look that said, 'Are you from PEOPLE magazine?' before conceding that, unlike Abe Lincoln, he'd had a heater."

Dowd describes Obama as a "tad testy" as he was "traipsing around desolate stretches of snowy -- and extremely white -- Iowa."

Obama had "moments of looking conflicted."

Dowd claims that no fewer than three times last week, Obama got indignant about the beach-babe attention given to a shot of him in the Hawaiian surf.

"You've been reporting on how I look in a swimsuit," Obama lectured a reporter.

Dowd snaps: "He poses for the cover of MEN'S VOGUE and then gets huffy when people don't treat him as Hannah Arendt."

Developing...