NASHUA, NH — Hillary Clinton is currently holding her second rally of the day here in Nashua, at the Nashua North High School. We managed our morning exercise (such as it is) just before 1 p.m. in the form of a half-mile walk between where we were finally able to find a parking space on the jam-packed road leading to the school. En route, a Hillary volunteer passed out stickers. As we approached, we heard the roar of applause and cheering from inside. Every day is a new day, and this crowd apparently hadn't gotten the memo that the Clinton era had ended. By the looks of it, it was still going strong — at least on a sunny, snow-covered afternoon in Nashua.
The rally, which was scheduled from 12 - 2, was correspondingly packed, with the fire marshal once again putting a foot down on occupancy. Outside the gymnasium, we ran into a somewhat exasperated Huma Abedin, right hand to the Senator, who was directing people to an overflow adjacent gym. "I'm sorry," she said "I wish we could let you all in. We were expecting a thousand people and 3,700 showed up. It's the fire marshal, we'd love to pack this place to the gills." Meanwhile, supporters were still arriving: Shortly after we walked into the adjoining gym, we were joined by a busload of Clinton supporters — our fellow riders on the way up — which had just arrived from Manchester.
Clinton, who has jumped on the "change" wagon of late, followed up last night's debate remark about the power of language saying, quoting Mario Cuomo: "You campaign with poetry, but you govern with prose." Clinton had just given a few pointed examples of same, calling out John Edwards, Barack Obama and Bill Richardson — by reference, not by name — on statements they'd made about what they had done. "If you give a speech saying you're going to vote against the Patriot Act, that's not change...If you say you've passed a Patient's Bill of Rights but you forget to mention that it never got signed into law, that's not change." Clinton saved her two best zingers for the end, noting that "if you rail against [lobbyists and special interest groups] but you voted for Dick Cheney's energy bill, that's not change" — and, finally:
If you gave a speech -- and a very good speech -- against the war in Iraq in 2002 and then by 2004 you're saying you're not sure how you would have voted, and by 2005 six and seven you've voted for $300 billion for the war you said you're against, that's not change.
Her voice rose and sharpened as she went, and the crowd reacted accordingly. "What I see as change is in the lives of people who've been affected by what I've done."
A few people left the main room, and a nice security guard let us in, which had the added bonus of having the cordoned-off press area with a wireless signal and outlets (for our woefully creaky technology). Inside the main room the crowd was diverse, with a particular overflow of small children and soldiers, and very energetic, with a contingent of younger people, one of whom — a self-proclaimed "broke" college student — asked Clinton a question about what she would do to reform student loans.
"I want to end the abusive practices of the student loan companies," she said, to what seemed to be the loudest cheers of the day. She went on, singling out "those financial aid forms" with pages of fine print to fill out, only to be rejected in what she termed "a cruel joke." (It was a phrase we'd heard her use in the early-morning hours on C-SPAN last night — makers of long, detailed forms, watch out for a Clinton presidency!). There were deafening cheers from the crowd, the most high-pitched and excited of the event thus far.
Clinton addressed all sorts of questions from the crowd, saying that she was "in favor of civil unions," and drawing the distinction between acknowledging the evil of Saddam Hussein and the rationale of a pre-emptive war, and in one of the more poignant moments, reading aloud a question from a man in an oxygen mask about mental health care for returning soldiers. Clinton talked about the concern of an epidemic of mental health issues for the waves of troops returning from Iraq and Afghanistan, and also spoke of traumatic brain injury as "signature injury of the war in Iraq." She concluded by saying: "I want mental health parity. There should be no difference between mental health and physical health."
In a lighter moment, still somewhat poignant, she laughed and noted, "There's two women standing down there saying, 'You know what? You are really likable.' And I'm thankful for that." Huge applause. Then she repeated her point about George Bush from last night's debate, about how he was well-known as the candidate you'd want to have a beer with. "And maybe they should have left it at that. Have a beer — don't vote him in as our president!" While that is true, today Clinton was that person: This was a very different Clinton than the frustrated and off-balance one who faced Obama last night.
The questions were still coming after the planned end time of 2 p.m., a number of questions after she'd called on her supposed last question. Then she seemed to wrap up: "If you honor me with your vote on Tuesday, I will work my heart out for you. I will give it my all, and I believe I will get most of it, if not all of it done...I think the country IS ready for a leader who will bring us together to make these changes." That sounded like an end note, but then someone asked another question. And then another. The rally was still going when we started packing up at 2:28 pm. Likable enough? Sure — the crowd seemed to like her just fine.
Media in attendance, in no particular order: Ben Smith, Joe Klein, Chris Matthews, John Dickerson, Rick Stengel and some one named Scott whom we met last night whose surname we felt that we were expected to know. Oops.
Photos by Glynnis MacNicol and Rachel Sklar. Updated "that's not change" quote courtesy of Ben Smith and his transcription skillz.