“I’m Ready to Lead,” Clinton Says at State Party Event
By DAVID POSTMAN
CHIEF POLITICAL REPORTER For SEATTLE TIMES
Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton worked to boost her less-than-front-runner status among state Democrats Monday night by declaring that "there is no reason for our country to be backsliding away from the progressive tradition that came out of the state of Washington."
Clinton trails Illinois Sen. Barack Obama in the money race in this state, though she has out-raised him nationally and dominates the polls.
At Benaroya Hall, Clinton won sustained cheers from the crowd of Democrats at the state party's Magnuson Awards Dinner. They applauded her for talking about health care and for promising that on her first day in office she'd overturn President Bush's ban on stem-cell research and tell the world, "The era of cowboy diplomacy is over."
And they liked the New York senator's direct shots at the Bush administration the best.
"Are you ready for a president and vice president who respect the Constitution of the United States?" she asked, rousing the crowd to its loudest ovation. "And are you ready to end the war in Iraq and bring our troops home?
"Well, if you're ready for change, I'm ready to lead."
