Paris Hilton's mother criticizes McCain's ad

WASHINGTON - Paris Hilton's mother doesn't share John McCain's sense of humor.

McCain, the Republican presidential candidate, said last week that his campaign ad mocking Democrat Barack Obama with images of Hilton and singer Britney Spears was part of an attempt to inject humor into the presidential race.

Yesterday, Kathy Hilton, a McCain donor, registered her disapproval.

"It is a complete waste of the country's time and attention at the very moment when millions of people are losing their homes and their jobs," she said in a short article posted on the liberal Huffington Post Web site. "And it is a completely frivolous way to choose the next president of the United States."

She also called the ad "a complete waste of the money John McCain's contributors have donated to his campaign." Kathy Hilton and her husband donated a total of $4,600 to McCain's campaign earlier this year.

The ad plays on Obama's popularity by dismissing him as a mere celebrity, like Hilton and Spears. The Obama campaign has said the ad is proof that McCain would rather launch negative attacks than debate important issues.

- AP

WASHINGTON - Now that Barack Obama has all but sewn up the Democratic nomination for president, he says convention delegates from Florida and Michigan should have full voting rights at the party's national convention.

The delegates were originally stripped because the two states violated party rules by holding primaries before Feb. 5. The delegates from each state were given half votes at a contentious party meeting in May.

Obama's former Democratic rival, Hillary Rodham Clinton, had won both primaries. Obama, in a letter yesterday to the party's credentials committee, said "party unity" called for the delegates to "participate fully alongside the delegates from the other states and territories."

- AP