Published: September 20, 2008 05:43 pm      

Hillary gets warm welcome in Pikeville

Stumps for Lunsford, Obama

PIKEVILLE — She’s now called the “adopted daughter of Kentucky,” and 350 of her eastern Kentucky admirers turned out to hear Hillary Clinton stump for Bruce Lunsford Saturday morning at the Pikeville-Pike County Regional Airport.

She turned heads and touted the candidacy of Lunsford, Democratic candidate for the U.S. Senate who is trying to unseat four-term incumbent Republican Senate Leader Mitch McConnell.

She may have turned at least a few votes for president.

Clinton said Lunsford will fight for Kentucky and push for alternative energy, including “clean coal,” and his election will rob the Republican minority of their chief strategist.

“I know how frustrating it is when we have good ideas and then run into the brick wall of opposition on the other side of the aisle,” Clinton said. “And you know who the leader of that opposition is – it’s your senior senator (McConnell), day after day, just standing in the way.”

Clinton spoke for 18 minutes and Lunsford for five. Lunsford pointed out Clinton received 91 percent of the Pike County vote in the May primary.

“I don’t think I can give you a better incentive on Nov. 4 than to give Hillary something – a U.S. Senate free of Mitch McConnell,” Lunsford shouted.

He decried the national debt, a “broken health care system” and the financial crisis, blaming President George Bush and McConnell.

Lunsford said “the Bush-McConnell policies . . . deregulate when times are good and bail ‘em out when times are bad – not you but them – every time.”

Lunsford “lived the American dream and then he provided it to others,” Clinton said, briefly reviewing Lunsford’s biography.

She called McConnell “a formidable politician with a long history of getting elected here in Kentucky. Some Democrats as well as Republicans have voted for him. But it’s time to ask yourself if you don’t think we can do better.”

McConnell was also campaigning Saturday in eastern Kentucky, making stops in Hazard and Monticello and then going to Pikeville for a fund raiser.

Responding to Clinton’s and Lunsford’s remarks, McConnell said, “Senator Clinton may have visited Kentucky today, but it’s the Obama-Lunsford agenda that’s on the ballot this fall.”

Rather than asking themselves who they are for, Clinton said, voters should ask “who is for me? Who is for me and my family, my community, my schools, my job in the coal mines, my veterans, my young people serving in the military right now?”

She said the country needs a “top to bottom cleaning in Washington come Nov. 4 and the only way we’re going to get it done is to work for Democrats from the top of the ticket to the bottom of the ticket.”

Pointing to one of several United Mine Workers members wearing “UMWA for Obama” T-shirts, Clinton said, “If you’re a mine worker there is only one choice and that choice is Barack Obama and Joe Biden and Bruce Lunsford.”

At least four times, Clinton urged the crowd and Kentucky voters to vote for Obama and Biden, usually adding Lunsford.

She mentioned the Republican ticket of John McCain and Sarah Palin only once, altering a line she delivered at the Democratic convention.

“No way; no how; no McCain and no Palin!”

Shannon Hogg, 33, of Whitesburg, said before Clinton’s speech she’s for Lunsford but wasn’t sure about Obama. Clinton changed her mind.

“Yeah, she got me. I’m voting for Obama.”

Lisa Hale, 43, a member of the Pike County Democratic Women’s Club, said Lunsford will easily carry Pike County. But she was uncertain she’d vote for Obama.

“Now, I’m going to vote for Obama,” Hale said after Clinton’s speech. “I just wish Hillary Clinton could’ve been there with him. She’s awesome.”

RONNIE ELLIS writes for CNHI News Service and is based in Frankfort. He can be reached by e-mail at rellis@cnhi.com.