President Clinton weighs in on his wife’s campaign
Former President Bill Clinton thinks the Democratic Party will be united in November, despite exit polls that indicate significant percentages of voters who support his wife or Barack Obama won’t vote for the other Democrat in the general election.
“I think it’s likely that we’ll be able to unite the party and win in November,’’ the former president told reporters during a joint campaign stop today with his wife, Hillary Rodham Clinton, at a Louisville diner. “Because, you know, these people have excited strong loyalties. It’s good. Look. We have more voters, more workers, more givers than ever before. But the energy is on our side. And the issues are on our side—the economy, Iraq, America’s position in the world.
“And you know, she has always said for her part and our family’s part, we’ve spent a lifetime in this party, we want to unite it. All she ever asked is, let everybody vote and count every vote. Do the right and decent thing by Florida and Michigan. Don’t let the Republicans look more enlightened than us, which they do today. Which is unbelievable. I never thought I would see that. And resolve all this fairly. See where we are. And see where we go.’’
The Clintons charmed patrons of Lynn’s Paradise Diner for about an hour. The former president even visited an art gallery next door after Natalie Lanier, a 27-year-old woman with physical disabilities, told him about her art on display. According to Lanier, the former president purchased a painting, but none of hers.
The aspiring first husband appeared relaxed and was chatty with reporters and TV cameras crews who followed him along one side of the diner while his wife worked the patrons on another row.
He talked to one photographer about attending a Chicago Cubs baseball game with his wife’s brothers. He also discussed the Kentucky Derby.
At one table he sat down next to an 11-year-old Virginia Call and gave her a lecture on the need for more women in science and engineering after she told him her favorite subject is math. His message: If the percentage of women majoring in science and engineering was the same as for men, the United States would be able to solve its shortage of scientists and engineers.
But he declined to talk to reporters about the possibility of a joint Obama-Clinton presidential ticket.
“I have no business talking about that,’’ he said. “There are only two people in America who should be talking about that. The rest of us should be on the sidelines.’’
He did weigh on whether Obama will be able claim to have a majority of pledged delegates after today’s primaries in Kentucky and Oregon. “There won’t be tonight unless you decapitate Michigan and Florida,’’ he said. “Which violate our values and is dumb politics.’’
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