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Saturday, February 23, 2008
Tony Hall, hitting the campaign trail for Hillary
Former U.S. Rep. Tony Hall of Dayton thought that when he endorsed Hillary Clinton earlier this month that the campaign most likely would deploy him to Dayton-area locales.
But his first campaign stops for Clinton, it runs out, will be in northern regions: Specifically, Mansfield, Marion and Bowling Green.
He and Gov. Ted Strickland, a fellow Clinton supporter, will hit the trail Sunday, Feb. 24, to stump for her.
They’ll start at 8 a.m. at the Main Street Methodist Church in Mansfield. Then they’ll go to the Mansfield Family Restaurant to show their support at 11:30. After that, it’s on to the Perkins Restaurant in Marion at 12:30 p.m.
They’ll close out the day at the Bowling Green Community Center in Bowling Green, where they’ll appear at 4:45 p.m. at a rally with former President Clinton.
Bill Clinton in Springfield on Sunday night
Former President Bill Clinton will be in Springfield Sunday, Feb. 24, to rally support for his wife, Hillary Clinton. The public event starts at 9 p.m. at the Springfield YMCA, 300 South Limestone St.
Obama responds to Clinton
Barack Obama doesnt’ think there’s anything “false and misleading” about the mailers his campaign recently sent out criticizing Hillary Clinton’s positions on NAFTA - the North American Free Trade Agreement - and universal health care.
Hours after Clinton lobbed those charges at Obama during a campaign stop in Cincinnati on Saturday, Feb 23, Obama retorted in a session with reporters in Columbus.
“We have been subject to a constant attack from the Clinton campaign except when we were down 20 points,” Obama said after events at the Ohio State University Medical Center.
“These (mailers) are accurate. Sen. Clinton, as part of the Clinton administration, supported NAFTA. In her book she called it one of the administration’s successes,” he said.
He said he wanted to point this out “in a state that has been devastated by trade” and where voters “are deeply concerned about the positions of the candidates on trade.”
Obama also said that Clinton has said her support for a mandate requiring that all Americans acquire health care coverage is a key difference between her plan and Obama’s which does not have a mandate.
She may not like how his campaign characterizes the mandate - that the government would force you to buy health care - , he said.
“The notion that we’re engaging in nefarious tactics, I think, is pretty hard to swallow,” said Obama.
Asked if he would consider conceding if he, instead of Clinton, had lost 10 or 11 straight nominating contests, he said:
“Look, I’m the challenger, I’m the upstart, I’m the insurgent. She’s the champ. She’s part of the Democratic network in Washington and if you’re the titleholder you don’t lose it on points, you’ve got to be knocked out.”
Obama’s coming to Dayton, try not to pass out
Daytonians will get their first live look at Barack Obama on Monday when he comes to the Nutter Center at Wright State University. Just a warning, Obama may be the first presidential candidate - at least since Ed Muskie - who’s making people cry and faint at his rallies. As you will see in the video, sometimes people get a little too excited at Obama rallies.
If you think you can handle the excitement, the doors open for the Obama rally at 4 p.m. at the Nutter Center, 3640 Colonel Glenn Highway. The event starts at 6. This event is free and open to the public. Tickets are not required, but RSVPs are strongly encouraged. To RSVP, please visit www.barackobama.com.
Limited preferred viewing tickets are available for the event, and can be picked up at: Obama For America Office, 40 N Main St, Dayton. Tickets available Monday from 8 a.m. - 4 p.m. For security reasons, no bags are allowed. Please limit personal belongings. No signs or banners permitted. Admission is on a first come, first served basis. Oh, and drink plenty of water … just in case you feel faint.
Obama campaign responds to Clinton attack
Barack Obama’s campaign responded on Saturday, Feb. 23 to charges Hillary Clinton made in Cincinnati earlier in the day that Obama was sending out misleading attacks on Clinton’s stance on NAFTA and her plan for universal health care.
Bill Burton, Obama’s press secretary, said:
“Everything in those mailers is completely accurate, unlike the discredited attacks from Hillary Clinton’s negative campaign that have been rejected in South Carolina, Wisconsin, and across America.
“We look forward to having a debate this Tuesday on the facts, and the facts are that Senator Clinton was a supporter of NAFTA and the China permanent trade treaties until this campaign began.”
Obama, campaigning in Columbus, did not mention NAFTA but criticized Clinton’s health care plan because it mandates that everyone acquire coverage.
“The main difference between us is that Senator Clinton includes a mandate, which means she’d have the government force you to buy health insurance, and she said she’d consider going after your wages if you don’t.
” I disagree with that approach. I believe that the reason Americans don’t have health care isn’t because no one’s forced them to buy it. It’s because no one’s made it affordable, and that’s why my plan does more to cut costs than any other that been offered in this race,” Obama said at a panel discussion at the Ohio State University Medical Center.
Obama and Clinton are scheduled to debate in Cleveland on Tuesday night.
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Strickland touts new Clinton ads
The Clinton campaign Saturday trotted out three new television ads to air statewide - one a 60-second ad using Sen. Hillary Clinton’s comments during the most recent debate in Texas, the second a 30-second ad aimed at arguing that Clinton would be the best candidate for Ohio’s struggling economy and the third a 30-second ad featuring former Sen. John Glenn extolling the strengths of Clinton.
The ads all began airing Saturday.
Ohio Gov. Ted Strickland, a Clinton supporter, said in a conference call Saturday that the 60-second ad, called “Resolve” shows voters the “Hillary Clinton I know” and the “Hillary Clinton America needs to know.”
He said he believes the ad demonstrates Clinton’s compassion and that “she cares more for others than herself.”
“It demonstrates to the people of America the depth of her caring,” he said, hours before he was scheduled to appear at Dayton’s Second Street Market to campaign for Clinton.
Howard Wolfson, Clinton’s communications director, said the ad aims to show voters “why she is running for president.”
The second ad, Strickland said, emphasizes Glenn’s endorsement.
“No one in Ohio has greater respect among the populace of either political persuasion than Sen. John Glenn,” Strickland said. “I think it’s quite significant that the senator and his wife Annie would be speaking up and saying in this ad that they believe Sen. Clinton is a fighter for Ohio and the values Ohioans embrace.”
The third ad repeats some of the thrust of Sen. Sherrod Brown’s successful 2006 U.S. Senate bid by proclaiming Clinton a fighter for America’s middle class.
“She’ll get tough on unfair trade deals and end tax breaks to companies that ship jobs overseas,” the ad intones.
A recent Quinnipiac University poll found that 32 percent of Ohio voters polled considered the economy their top issue.
Strickland also sought to pooh-pooh a story that appeared in the Saturday, Feb. 23 edition of the Washington Post that reported that the Clinton campaign was disheartened and anticipating defeat.
“There is intense enthusiasm for her here,” he said. “I think I know Ohio very well…and I am very confident. And with every passing day I feel more encouraged that Ohio is going to be a strong supporter on March 4, and be a part of the effort, with Texas, to propel her forward to the nomination.”
Springfield, Dayton to get some love from the Gov.
Gov. Ted Strickland, a Hillary Clinton supporter, will be making two campaign stops in the region today, Feb. 23, the Clinton campaign announced today.
At 2:15 p.m., he’ll stump for Clinton at Second Street Market in Dayton, 600 E 2nd St.
At 4 p.m., he’ll greet students and supporters at Wittenberg University, appearing at the Post 95 Coffee Shop, Benham-Pence Student Center.
Clinton: “Shame on you Barack Obama”
Sen. Hillary Clinton came out swinging against her rival Barack Obama on Saturday, accusing him of mailing out false material about her stance on NAFTA and her plan for universal health care.
“Let’s have a real campaign. Enough with the speeches and the big rallies and then using tactics that are right out of Karl Rove’s play book. This is wrong,” she told reporters after a rally with 1,500 supporters at Cincinnati State Technical and Community College.
“Shame on you Barack Obama. It is time you ran a campaign consistent with your messages in public. That’s what I expect from you. Meet me in Ohio, let’s have a debate about your tactics and your behavior in this campaign.”
Obama and Clinton are scheduled to debate in Cleveland on Tuesday night.
During her 40-minute speech in Cincinnati, Clinton seemed reinvigorated compared to a somber town hall meeting she held the night before in Columbus.
On Saturday, Clinton drew parallels between George W. Bush and Obama as men whose campaign rhetoric has been about change without supplying details.
“There is no telling how much damage President Bush has done to our country. You know, people have talked a lot about change in this election. Well we have lived through some of the worst change that anybody can imagine in the last seven years,” she told the crowd. “Do you think people voting in 2000 knew what they were getting? I don’t. People thought they were getting a ‘compassionate conservative’ didn’t they. It turned out he was neither. And we have lived with the consequences of those mistakes year after year after year. You know when he ran for office, he promised change. He promised he would keep our country safe, he promised that he would tackle global warming. He never said anything about taking a balanced budget and a surplus and throwing it out the window, putting us in debt with a rising deficit. He didn’t say anything about the kind of change he would bring…He promised change as a compassionate conservative and the American people got shafted.”
Clinton stressed, again, her experience and readiness to be commander in chief.
“This is a dangerous world we live in. That is sometimes forgotten. It is sometimes over looked in the heat of this election but I know it’s true because I went to Ground Zero the day after 9/11. I know we have enemies who plotting against us as we speak. We need a president and commander in chief who has no illusions about what it will take to protect and defend the United States of America,” Clinton said.
She pledged to end the war in Iraq and bring the troops home.
