Clinton Scolds McCain on Farm Bill, Attempts to Simulate General Election
BATH, S.D. — Hillary Rodham Clinton scolded John McCain Thursday for opposing the farm bill, attempting to maintain the sense that she is already competing against the certain Republican presidential nominee even as her chances for winning the Democratic nomination dim.
As she chatted up rural South Dakotans, Clinton largely ignored Democratic rival Barack Obama, who continued to gain ground in delegates needed to clinch the nomination and picked up a sought-after endorsement from former Sen. John Edwards this week.
Clinton noted that President Bush has said he will veto the farm bill, which Congress passed Thursday. McCain also has said he would veto the bill if he were president.
“They’re like two sides of the same coin, and it doesn’t amount to much change, does it?” the New York senator said. “I believe saying no to the farm bill is saying no to rural America.”
Bush and McCain both say the bill, which boosts farm subsidies and includes more money for food stamps, is fiscally irresponsible and too generous to wealthy corporate farmers.
“When Bear Stearns needed assistance, we stepped in with a $30 billion package. But when our farmers need help, all they get from Senator McCain and President Bush is a veto threat,” Clinton said.
Obama applauded the bill’s passage in a statement released by his campaign, saying the measure was “far from perfect,” but “with so much at stake, we cannot make the perfect the enemy of the good.”
The Illinois senator also chided McCain and Bush for “saying no to America’s farmers and ranchers, no to energy independence, no to the environment, and no to millions of hungry people.”
Clinton chose South Dakota for her first campaign appearance since her West Virginia win earlier this week, signaling that she is sticking around until the final primaries on June 3 despite call from some Democrats to close ranks behind Obama. South Dakota and Montana vote that day — the finish line on the primary calendar.
“There are a lot of people who say, ‘Well we should just wrap this up,”‘ Clinton told several hundred South Dakotans while standing on the porch of a fourth-generation family farmhouse in Bath. “Well I’ve never been impatient with democracy.”
Meanwhile, in Kentucky, husband Bill Clinton urged voters to ignore those who say Obama will be the nominee. Kentucky holds its presidential primary on Tuesday.
“Your voice still counts,” the former president said. “They’ve tried to bury her more times than a cat has lives.”
While chatting briefly with reporters as she flew to South Dakota, Clinton stuck to small talk, like describing the deer she occasionally sees outside her Washington home. She refused to comment on Edwards’ endorsement. Both she and Obama had sought his backing.
Later, in Rapid City, she said she had a “great deal of respect” for Edwards.
“He and I have a lot in common … I imagine that Senator Edwards’ endorsement will be of some help to Senator Obama in Kentucky, but I think that what matters are the people who actually vote,” Clinton said before heading to California for a fundraiser.
Clinton said she had not spoken with Edwards but had spoken with his wife, Elizabeth, about the endorsement. She declined to discuss their conversation.
The former first lady has maintained that her West Virginia triumph over Obama bolsters her argument that she would be the stronger nominee to face McCain in key states in the fall.
Left with an increasingly unrealistic mathematical path to the nomination, Clinton has turned to philosophical arguments in an attempt to appeal to the party leaders and elected officials, known as superdelegates, whose support will likely determine the nominee.
Suffering from money woes of more than $20 million in debt and trailing Obama in fundraising power, Clinton met with her finance team and top fundraisers at her Washington home on Wednesday to rally her forces. The message to the group was to remind them that she now has the lead in votes cast thus far throughout the primary season.
Her campaign continues to site a total, however, that includes results from the Florida and Michigan contests that the national Democratic Party has not recognized.
You have to admire Hillary’s true grit!
Why do the Writers continue to WORRY about Hillary’s MONEY??? She is NOT worried about it. Do you bother to report that Romney spent over 40 Millon on his campaign and did not have a problem with it and has no plans to try to recover any of it. And Hillary is much more able to afford it than he is…SHE believes it is for a GREAT CAUSE and what BETTER CAUSE THEN to have the BEST LEADER in the WHITE HOUSE> IF the OBAMA DRAMA get in there we will be in MORE trouble than we ever thougth possible with BUSH….Atleast Bush likes the Country and White people which is MORE than we can say for the Obama’s??????????????/
Twenty percent of the Farm Bill goes toward farm aid. Guess what the other eighty percent is for!
Three hundred billion dollar Bill. Two hundred forty billion is earmarks.
It is pure greed and they want to raise “our” taxes??? Eighty percent is not enough?
Two hundred and forty billion dollars buys a lot of energy exploration.
It is a shameless rip-off!
At this point Senator Clinton should not be scolding anyone except her campaign management. She should be singing now that it’s OVER!
Clinton and the others who voted for this bill are simply pandering. I wonder when they will give the same guarantees to auto dealers, contractors and small businesses that they do for farmers. Seems like everyone is on the take these days.
What does McCain or obama care about the farmers…..they are just hard workers
Operation Chaos is in full force. Dems please beware of the Republican operatives who are stirring up trouble between Dem bloggers. At the point, true Dems should not engage in hateful talk with other Dems. When you read racist views towards Obama from supposedly Hillary supporters who are switching party to vote Mc Shame, please don’t attack or feel resentment towards other Dems. That is a trick to divide the Democratic Party.
I am a lifelong Dem, not a member of Operation Chaos, and I assure you that I will consider not voting for the Dems if Obama is the nominee. I suppose the more than 50% of Hillary supporters from exit polls in Pennsylvania, NC, IN, and WV were all Operation Chaos members? Get real. The Dems are in trouble and we walked into it with eyes wide open.
I think at last it’s caught up with her, and it is sad to be chucked out into the cold. Politics have glamour and some love it, but it has very little left for you when they want to get rid of you.