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Back Obama to the end, Clinton tells YSU audience
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Hilary Clinton came out to show her support for Barack Obama at the YSU Beeghly Hall rally on Friday.
Hilary YSU
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Obama for America: Hilary Clinton comes to the Valley's YSU Beeghly Hall to rally support for Barack Obama and Joe Biden.
By Harold Gwin
The N.Y. senator visited Ohio on Friday to stump for the Obama-Biden ticket.
YOUNGSTOWN — Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton believes this is the moment in American history when the country needs leadership with a comprehensive economic vision.
That leadership can be found in Barack Obama, the Democratic nominee for president, as opposed to the policy of Republican candidate John McCain — who wants to leave everything up to the open market, Clinton said.
The senator from New York was in Youngstown on Friday stumping for the Barack Obama-Joe Biden ticket, and spoke with The Vindicator after a “Change We Need” rally at Beeghly Center on the Youngstown State University campus.
There are major differences between the Democratic and Republican presidential candidates when it comes to the economy, Clinton said, adding that Obama’s tax policy would help the vast majority of Americans by cutting their taxes. Only those making $250,000 or more a year could expect a tax increase, she said.
On energy, Obama has a clear strategy to invest in “green jobs” to benefit Ohio while McCain favors giving more big tax breaks for energy companies, Clinton said.
On all of the important points related to the economy, Ohio will be better off under an Obama presidency, she said.
The race is very close in Ohio, one of the so-called battleground states up for grabs, and the Obama campaign is sending a clear message, through repeated campaign visits by the candidates and key supporters, that it isn’t forgetting what Ohio needs and that it needs Ohioans’ support, she said.
There’s a danger of complacency because the polls show Obama with a double-digit lead, Clinton said.
If people think the election is already over, they won’t come out and vote, and they won’t sustain the energy and activity needed to assure a victory, she said. It’s still a very challenging election for Democrats, and people need to keep working, she said.
The presidential campaign process in this country is too long and too expensive, the senator said, noting that most other democracies in the world don’t put their candidates through what they must face here.
Campaigns can run for years, and the country needs to find a way to lessen both the time and expense of that process, she said.
On the education front, the seven-year-old federal No Child Left Behind law is up for renewal, and Clinton said Obama, as president, would direct that a complete assessment of the law be done and then come up with his own signature education policy.
The original law called for universal proficiency in reading and math by 2013-14, but Clinton said that’s an unrealistic goal. No country in the world has those standards, she said.
Obama has called for some changes in the law, including enhanced accountability, and strongly opposes any unfunded mandates that would put more costs on the states and the schools, Clinton said.
The senator addressed a crowd of 700-800 in Beeghly Center, assuring them that she is aware of the anxiety the current economic conditions have caused, but adding that she “saw the future” when visiting the Lordstown GM plant while a candidate for the Democratic nomination for president.
Wouldn’t it be nice to have a president who cares about manufacturing? she asked the crowd, drawing a roar of support.
Democrats inherited and cleaned up an economic crisis in 1993, she said, a reference to her husband’s eight years in the White House after President George H.W. Bush.
“I don’t think there’s ever been a more important election ... after what we’ve been through the last eight years,” she said in reference to the presidency of George W. Bush.
It took a Democrat to clean up after the first President Bush, and it will take a Democrat to clean up after the second, she told the crowd.
Clinton said she has a new slogan for America, “Jobs, baby jobs. That is what this election is about.”
“It’s time to chart a new course, Ohio,” she said.
gwin@vindy.com