(CBS 5 / AP) WASHINGTON The rival presidential campaigns of Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama traded accusations of nasty politics Wednesday over Hollywood donor David Geffen, who once backed Bill Clinton but now supports his wife's top rival.The Clinton campaign demanded that Obama denounce comments made by the DreamWorks movie studio founder, who told New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd in Wednesday's editions that while "everybody in politics lies," the former president and his wife "do it with such ease, it's troubling."The Clinton camp also called on Obama to give back Geffen's $2,300 contribution.Campaigning in Iowa, Obama refused."It's not clear to me why I'd be apologizing for someone else's remark," the Illinois senator said.For her part, New York Sen. Clinton sidestepped questions, leaving the issue to her aides to discuss."I'm just going to stay focused on my campaign and I'm going to run a positive campaign about the issues that affect the people in our country," she told The Associated Press in an interview in Nevada.

Ostaszewski: Long season: Democrat style

This column is the second of a two-part series taking a closer look at next year's looming presidential election. An election that, in case you've been too busy following the daily antics of America's zany celebrity nut jobs to notice, officially kicked off when the first candidate jumped into the race early by announcing his candidacy back in December of 1977.

That is the sort of lead time modern presidential campaigns need today. Right now, there are presidential exploratory committees being formed in second grade classrooms all across the United States in preparation for the 2052 election.

Harvey Beane, currently a student in Miss Swineliver's class at the Barry M. Goldwater Elementary School in Prescott, Ariz., is the early favorite with a platform that emphasizes more video game playing time and, to woo the crucial pro-cookie voter, takes a decidedly anti-vegetable stance.

Clinton, Obama in Hollywood 'Slash and Burn' Spat

The 2008 Democratic presidential race quickly turned nasty Wednesday, as Hillary Clinton's camp laid into rising star rival Barack Obama, even as he savored a million-dollar Hollywood debut. Comments by movie mogul David Geffen, co-host of a lavish Obama fundraiser, on Clinton and her former president husband prompted her aides to accuse the Illinois senator of using the "slash and burn" politics he publicly decries. The spat erupted hours after director Steven Spielberg and stars such as Jennifer Aniston and Eddie Murphy reportedly helped Tinseltown glitterati raise more than $1.3 million for Obama's White House bid. With tensions rising 11 months before the first party nominating contests, the row centered on a New York Times column Wednesday, in which Geffen was quoted as branding Senator Clinton overly ambitious and "polarizing." Geffen also hit out at Bill Clinton -- for whom he once mined Hollywood's power elite for millions of dollars of vital campaign cash.

Vilsack exits presidential race, citing lack of funding

DES MOINES, Iowa - Democrat Tom Vilsack, the former Iowa governor who built a centrist image, abandoned his bid for the presidency on Friday after struggling against better-known, better-financed rivals.

"It is money and only money that is the reason we are leaving today," Vilsack told reporters at a news conference, later adding, "We have a debt we're going to have to work our way through."

Vilsack, 56, left office in January and traveled to early voting states, but he attracted neither the attention nor the campaign cash of his top-tier rivals - Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, Sen. Barack Obama and John Edwards.

In the most recent financial documents, Vilsack reported raising more than $1.1 million in the last seven weeks of 2006 but only had around $396,000 in the bank.

Obama-rama feeling as Sen. Obama rallies Austin supporters

Obama-rama sweeps Austin today as Democrat Barack Obama brings his 13-day-old presidential campaign to the Texas capital for a rare political do next to Town Lake.