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In Kirkwood, Bill Clinton makes an economic argument for Obama

This article first appeared in the St. Louis Beacon: October 20, 2008 - Former President Bill Clinton told an overflow crowd at Kirkwood High School on Monday night that Barack Obama offered the best hope of fixing the financial crisis that “has got everybody’s attention.”

Speaking in the high school gymnasium, which was packed to capacity, Clinton said that the final presidential debate showed the nation who was best suited to win the White House.

He said that GOP nominee John McCain has tried to get away from Republican orthodoxy during that debate, “but it was clear who really understood the issues and had a clear idea of what to do, clear who was going to go forward with a plan and that was Barack Obama.”

Clinton added: “We have to restore the American dream and get jobs back (so that) wages go up again.”

Clinton said one of the biggest failures of the early years of the Bush administration was not having a job strategy.

“You’ve got to have a job strategy to create a source of new jobs,” he said.

During his eight years in office, Clinton said over 22 million new jobs were created. During the Bush years, he said family income had dropped more than $2,000 while it went up $7,500 by the time Clinton left office.

In addition, Clinton said, 8 million Americans worked their way out of poverty and into the middle class during the 1990s. Now, he said, 6 million have fallen back into poverty.

“Barack Obama can turn that around,” he said to loud cheering from the audience.

He also offered the audience an economics lesson in the way mortgage foreclosures are affecting everyone. He said some might dismiss the foreclosures as cases of “my neighbors are in trouble because they were dumb enough to get a subprime loan” and don’t deserve help. He urged voters to appreciate how the crisis is affecting ordinary people.

According to Clinton, the average foreclosure costs the economy about $250,000. That cost included loss of property tax revenue generated for the local school district and the local government, he said.

In addition, he said the value of all the neighbors’ homes falls because of foreclosures, and he said that development hurts most Americans because the only savings most people have are tied to their homes.

Unless the next administration and Congress address the problem, Clinton warned, the nation could expect about 2.5 million foreclosures next year, adding that a foreclosure rate of that magnitude would add up to $500 billion in economic losses.

“We’re not out of the woods yet,” Clinton said. “But we can get out of the woods.”

The first step, he said, is to put Obama in the White House. He said Obama would not only address economic issues, but would offer good health care and education reforms as well.

Clinton was a big draw for Democrats still uncertain whether their party will sew up Missouri for Obama. They certainly hope Clinton’s appearance will work some magic. After all, he carried Missouri during both of his elections.

And he showed that he still can draw a crowd. Unofficial estimates put the number at the rally at 6,000 people, including over 2,000 inside the gymnasium and another 4,000 standing outside and listening to the speech on speakers and video screens mounted outside the building.

Many of those who couldn’t get inside didn’t seem to mind. They said they were pleased that they had come and hoped that people also would go to the polls and support Democrats in the November election.

In a wide-ranging speech, which he called a conversation with voters, Clinton argued that “Barack Obama has better energy ideas, better economic policies, a better health-care policy and better education policies” than John McCain.

Clinton said he was especially troubled by a health-care system that “is eating us alive.” Even if Obama fixes the financial problems, Clinton said the U.S. economy wouldn’t be competitive “if we keep spending 50 percent more on our health-care system than any country on earth” and still do not insure millions of people.

He talked about families at the end of the rope because of health-care expenses beyond their ability to pay. Others, he said, couldn’t afford medical treatment for children suffering from autism and other major illnesses. As an aside, to which the audience responded with cheers, Clinton said, “We need to do this stem cell research” that might help autistic children whose numbers he said had tripled in 15 years.

It may have been mere coincidence or a close reading of some issues that are on the minds of voters in Missouri that led Clinton to drop in a line about stem cell research and mention, too, the harm of Medicaid cuts like those Republicans have put in place in Missouri.

In any case, Clinton used the example of one family to suggest that current health policies seemed to contradict core GOP beliefs. He said one woman he met on the campaign trail had told him the Medicaid policies had left her with three options: eat and allow a retarded son to die; starve so the family could pay for the medical care; or get a divorce so her child would qualify for Medicaid. The woman told Clinton, “Honey, I’m from rural Indiana. Those aren’t my family values.”

He added: “I’m just telling you, folks, this is the real America out there. These are hard-working people that life dealt a tough hand. They are at the cutting edge of the crisis in health care.”

In addition, he said Obama was best suited to “restoring America’s standing in the world,” and he implied that the Bush administration had not bothered to listen to enough diverse voices on foreign policy issues.

Clinton recalled a recent luncheon his wife had set up for retired admirals and generals who had endorsed her during the presidential primary in which she and Obama competed for the nomination. At the luncheon, Clinton related, one of the retirees stood up and said, “You know it’s been eight years since anybody pulled us together and asked what we thought.”

Clinton told the crowd that the next president must focus on “building a world with more partners, fewer enemies (and) a forthright statement that military force should always be a last resort not a first option.”

He also offered a few one-liners. In an indirect jab at both McCain and GOP vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin, Clinton mentioned that voters learn a lot about a presidential nominee from the one key decision made during the campaign – the choice for vice president.

In another comment, he mentioned that 80 percent of school systems had cut back in teaching history and economics because of budget cuts.

Then, with a smile, he asked: “Wouldn’t you have liked it a lot better if the leaders of your government knew something about history and economics?”

The crowd roared once again.

Robert Joiner has carved a niche in providing informed reporting about a range of medical issues. He won a Dennis A. Hunt Journalism Award for the Beacon’s "Worlds Apart" series on health-care disparities. His journalism experience includes working at the St. Louis American and the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, where he was a beat reporter, wire editor, editorial writer, columnist, and member of the Washington bureau.