Clinton campaigns against troop surge By Ed Tibbetts | Monday, January 29, 2007
U.S. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., argued Sunday for a pragmatic approach to stop the troop escalation in Iraq, saying it's easy to appeal to people with "soundbites" and calls to cut off funding. Clinton wrapped up a two-day swing through Iowa by spending much of the day in Davenport.
She greeted breakfast-goers at the Hickory Garden Family Restaurant, told several hundred people at the Mississippi Valley Fairgrounds she opposed the troop increase and, later, took questions at a news conference at Central High School packed with perhaps 100 journalists.
Clinton made what she promised would be the first of many trips to Iowa, site of the first-in-the-nation presidential caucuses.
She announced 10 days ago she's running for president.
Many admirers greeted her Sunday. But there were direct questions, too, like about her 2002 vote to authorize President Bush to go to war.
Clinton, in interviews and before crowds, said she took responsibility for her vote but claimed the president abused it and was at the "height of irresponsibility" by saying the war would last beyond his years in office.
She steadfastly refused to call he vote a "mistake" and said what's important now is that Congress build bipartisan pressure to stop the buildup and redeploy troops.
She said cutting off funding for the troop increase isn't the answer.
"It is easy to have a soundbite and say something that is emotionally gratifying," Clinton said, but a bipartisan vote of disapproval would "send a very clear message to the White House."
"This is an evolving policy," she said in an interview with the Quad- City Times. "We're working hard to do anything that gets the president's attention."
Other Democratic presidential candidates, such as John Edwards and Tom Vilsack, have called for a more-forceful approach.
Clinton was making her first trip to Davenport in years, and one of the challenges she faces is getting past preconceptions of her.
Her unfavorable ratings in polls tend to be higher than other Democratic presidential candidates.
Still, there were plenty of people willing to give her the benefit of the doubt.
"She seems to be a lot more in touch with our needs," said Karen Hean, of Davenport. "The Senate has helped her."
Donna Knoeferl, also of Davenport, already was convinced. "I've followed her career. She's the one woman famous for no one really knowing her," she said.
Clinton got an unexpected laugh at the fairgrounds when a questioner, referring to terrorists in the world, asked about her experience dealing with "evil and bad men."
Repeating the question, Clinton said, "What in my background equips me to deal with evil and bad men?"
That prompted growing laughter in the crowd, with Clinton smiling herself.
After a long pause, she said, "on a slightly more serious note," then gave an answer on dealing with terrorists.
Later, at the news conference, Clinton was asked three times about the incident and laughed at being "psycho-analyzed." She brushed off the idea, broached by a reporter, that the audience was thinking of the well-publicized behavior of her husband.
The former first lady did conjure up memories of former President Bill Clinton in at least this respect: She hung around the fairgrounds long after most people left, shaking hands, signing autographs and posing for pictures.
She also won high marks from at least one man who served in Iraq.
Eli Shetler, of Moline, said he was grateful Clinton held her criticism of the president to a minimum because, while he thought Bush's performance has been lacking, "I'm ready to hear answers."
Shetler's 11-year-old daughter Cassie handed a large poster to Clinton that read "Hillary Clinton. For your Future."
Clinton signed it and gave it an A-plus, telling her to "follow your dreams."
"It was cool," Cassie said.
Clinton took questions on education, trade and health care and pledged her loyalty to ethanol, too.
In the interview with the Times she said she is now an ethanol booster, despite her vote less than two years ago against a measure requiring 7.5 billion gallons of ethanol be mixed with the nation's fuel system by 2012.
The mandate has created a greater market for the corn-based fuel.
Clinton said she opposed the measure because there were worries in 2005 that ethanol would drive up the price of gasoline in New York, as well as other concerns. She said Sunday those concerns have been alleviated.
"I am a very avid promoter of ethanol," she said. "Balancing what my obligations to New York were and what the situation is now, I have no reservations at all."
Clinton also continued to call for robust free trade but said it should be "smart, pro-American trade."
Rory Washburn, executive director of the Tri-City Building Trades Council, said Clinton had work to do with labor but that her remarks showed him she had their concerns in mind.
"Labor standards need to be upheld," he said.