Clinton: 'Barack Obama is My Candidate'

If there was tension in the hall when Hillary Clinton took the podium tonight you'd never know it from looking at her face. After all the hand-wringing about whether Clinton supporters would "get over it", Hillary seemed to be the one person who was indeed over it. Rocking an excellent orange pantsuit, she opened her speech with an unstinting call for unity:

I am honored to be here tonight. A proud mother. A proud Democrat. A proud American. And a proud supporter of Barack Obama.

My friends, it is time to take back the country we love.

Whether you voted for me, or voted for Barack, the time is now to unite as a single party with a single purpose. We are on the same team, and none of us can sit on the sidelines.

This is a fight for the future. And it's a fight we must win.

I haven't spent the past 35 years in the trenches advocating for children, campaigning for universal health care, helping parents balance work and family, and fighting for women's rights at home and around the world . . . to see another Republican in the White House squander the promise of our country and the hopes of our people.

And you haven't worked so hard over the last 18 months, or endured the last eight years, to suffer through more failed leadership.

No way. No how. No McCain.

Barack Obama is my candidate. And he must be our President.

The crowd (all of it, not just the nearly 50% of the delegates who were elected to support her) greeted Clinton enthusiastically, frequently interrupting her with applause and even a few standing ovations. And, in an indication that some of the wounds from the primary have begun to heal, they roared with approval whenever images of Bill Clinton appeared on the monitor.

Clinton turned next to her own failed bid for the nomination, reminiscing about some of the people she had met (she called her supporters "the sisterhood of the traveling pantsuits") and the issues she had vowed to fight for if elected. Those goals, she said, are the reason she supports Barack Obama over John McCain. And she urged her supporters to view the election in that light too.

I want you to ask yourselves: Were you in this campaign just for me? Or were you in it for that young Marine and others like him? Were you in it for that mom struggling with cancer while raising her kids? Were you in it for that boy and his mom surviving on the minimum wage? Were you in it for all the people in this country who feel invisible?

She went on to hammer John McCain's positions on a litany of issues: the economy; health care; Social Security; equal pay for women; etc. And she followed the party talking-point of linking McCain with President Bush, firing this zinger:

With an agenda like that, it makes sense that George Bush and John McCain will be together next week in the Twin Cities. Because these days they're awfully hard to tell apart.

As NPR's Ken Rudin remarked, it was an Ann Richards moment.

And Clinton cast this year's election in the most urgent of terms:

We don't have a moment to lose or a vote to spare.

Nothing less than the fate of our nation and the future of our children hang in the balance.

Clinton's name will be put into nomination during the roll-call vote tomorrow night. Some reports indicate that the Clinton and Obama camps are working out a deal to prevent a cumbersome tallying of delegate votes from each state, commonwealth, district, and territory. For example, the roll-call could be cut short after a few states with a proposal -- maybe even from Clinton herself -- to nominate Obama by acclamation.

The speech was everything the Obama camp could have asked for, and more. Now it's up to her supporters to decide if they will follow her lead.

-- Evie Stone

10:41 PM ET | 08-26-2008 | permalink

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