There's a new Obama-related controversy brewing among conservatives this morning and ABC's Jake Tapper reports that John McCain is planning to jump all over it.  The source is a 2001 appearance by the then-state senator on Chicago Public Radio's Odyssey.  The subject of the program was "how slavery affected the U.S. Constitution."  During the discussion, Obama argued that while the Warren Court ensured numerous civil rights, it "never ventured into the issues of redistribution of wealth, and of more basic issues such as political and economic justice in society."  Obama added that the Court "didn’t break free from the essential constraints that were placed by the founding fathers in the Constitution." 

Now while most conservative bloggers and commentators are latching on to the "redistribution of wealth" quote as evidence of Obama "expos[ing] himself as a Marxist," syndicated radio host Rush Limbaugh took it a step further on Chicago radio this morning, falsely claiming that Obama said "he doesn't believe in the U.S. Constitution."  Listen to his comments on Mancow Muller's new WLS show:

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LIMBAUGH:  I just think it's about the economy right now.  You mentioned cap gains -- that may be a little sophisticated.  But this Obama tape that's out there is not.  It's not too sophisticated.  It is easily understood.  When you've got a guy out there saying that he doesn't believe in the U.S. Constitution, yet he's got to take an oath to defend it and protect it.  I mean, did Hillary put this out?  Where's this been?  How come this has not come out until now?  Now there's a lot of undecideds and that's where this tape and that's where the economic mantle on Obama can have some impact here in the final week.

Below is the partial Odyssey transcript being passed around by right-wing blogs:

OBAMA: If you look at the victories and failures of the civil rights movement and its litigation strategy in the court. I think where it succeeded was to invest formal rights in previously dispossessed people, so that now I would have the right to vote. I would now be able to sit at the lunch counter and order as long as I could pay for it I’d be okay. But the Supreme Court never ventured into the issues of redistribution of wealth, and of more basic issues such as political and economic justice in society.

To that extent, as radical as I think people try to characterize the Warren Court, it wasn’t that radical. It didn’t break free from the essential constraints that were placed by the founding fathers in the Constitution, at least as its been interpreted and Warren Court interpreted in the same way, that generally the Constitution is a charter of negative liberties. Says what the states can’t do to you. Says what the federal government can’t do to you, but doesn’t say what the federal government or state government must do on your behalf.  And that hasn’t shifted and one of the, I think, tragedies of the civil rights movement was, because the civil rights movement became so court focused, I think there was a tendency to lose track of the political and community organizing and activities on the ground that are able to put together the actual coalition of powers through which you bring about redistributive change. In some ways we still suffer from that. […]

CALLER: The gentleman made the point that the Warren Court wasn't terribly radical with economic changes.  My question: is it too late for that kind of repairative work economically?  And is that the appropriate place for repairative work economically to take place?

HOST: You mean the court?

CALLER: The courts.  Or would it be legislation at this point?

CALLER: Maybe I'm showing my bias here as a legislator as well as a law professor. I’m not optimistic about bringing about major redistributive change through the courts. You know, the institution just isn’t structured that way.

Limbaugh's claim that Obama said he "doesn't believe in the U.S. Constitution" seems to stem from Barack's remarks about the document being "a charter of negative liberties."  But as the transcript makes clear, while Obama acknowledges this characteristic as a reality, he never suggests that it's a flaw.  Rather, as campaign spokesman Bill Burton put it, "Obama's point -- and what he called a tragedy -- was that legal victories in the Civil Rights [movement] led too many people to rely on courts to change society for the better."

Meanwhile, a separate argument is taking place over what Obama meant by "redistributive change" and the University of Chicago's Cass Sunstein is taking the lead in defending the Democratic nominee on this front.

Here are links to the full transcript and audio of the September 6, 2001 edition of Odyssey.