DES MOINES, IOWA — The race for the Democratic presidential nomination moved into overdrive Saturday, as candidates scrambled to outdo each other to win over the Iowa activists who will lead off the contest Jan. 3.
Six Democratic rivals trotted out celebrities, filled the air with populist rhetoric and schmoozed party regulars in the most hectic day of a campaign that’s been intense for months.
The city took on a circuslike atmosphere as candidates raced from forums to rallies to marches to receptions, capped by the Iowa Democratic Party’s annual fundraising dinner before 9,000 boisterous activists who chanted and cheered in the event that traditionally serves to begin the sprint to Iowa’s leadoff caucuses in January.
Some of the hottest rhetoric of the night came from John Edwards, who has sounded an increasingly sharp populist theme in recent weeks. “It is time for us as a party to stand up with some backbone and some strength for what we actually believe in,” Edwards said. “We do not believe in allowing lobbyists to write the laws of the United States of America, and we do not believe that we are above the law.”
Edwards made a pointed reference to former President Clinton and his failed effort to overhaul the nation’s health care system, an effort led by this year’s rival, Hillary Rodham Clinton.
“It is not enough,” Edwards said. “Look at what happened in the 1990s when we had a Democratic president, a Democratic House and a Democratic Senate, but still drug companies, insurance companies and their lobbyists killed universal health care in the United States of America.”
Clinton has a significant lead nationally but only a small edge in Iowa, where she is being pressed by both Barack Obama and Edwards.
Clinton and Obama stacked the hall with larger contingents than their rivals.
“When I am your nominee, my opponent won’t be able to say that I supported this war in Iraq, or that I gave George Bush the benefit of the doubt on Iran,” Obama said. “And he won’t be able to say that I wavered on something as fundamental as whether it’s OK for America to use torture – because it’s never OK.”
Obama has been critical of Clinton on all those issues, and he said Democrats are at their best “when we’ve led not by polls but by principle, not by calculation but by conviction, when we’ve had leaders who could summon the entire nation to a common purpose – a higher purpose.”
Clinton argued the party should pick “a nominee who has been tested and elect a president who is ready to lead on Day One.
“Fortunately, I have a little experience standing up and fighting for what I believe is right and what I believe America needs and how we can get there together.”
Bill Richardson joined in the chorus of criticism over the war.
“The leading candidates are talking about keeping troops (in Iraq) until 2013,” Richardson said. “I will bring troops home within one year, and we will do it with a plan, a political compromise.”
McCain negotiating for $3 million line of credit
WASHINGTON — Republican John McCain, climbing in polls but lagging in money, is negotiating a loan.
Campaign aides said they hoped to finalize arrangements within days for a line of credit of about $3 million to help pay for expenses as well as for ads, mailings and other means of voter contact.
The campaign also is considering taking public matching funds, but some aides fear the attached spending limits could hinder McCain if he gets the nomination.
Question planted at Clinton forum
DES MOINES, IOWA — An aide for Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton gave a Grinnell College student a question to ask the Democratic presidential candidate during a forum last week.
That the question had been planted was not mentioned at the event.
“This is not standard policy and will not be repeated again,” the campaign said in a statement Friday night. Clinton did not know when she called on the student that the question had been suggested by one of her staff, the campaign said.
Student Muriel Gallo-Chasanoff told Grinnell’s student newspaper that she was asked by a Clinton staffer to pose a question about global warming at Tuesday’s event. She also said staffers prompted Clinton to call on her, the paper reported.
