What Is a Bill Clinton Stump Speech Like?
As our story told in pictures last night, we went to a Bill Clinton rally at Virginia's George Mason University last night, and the young ladies in the crowd were v.v. enthusiastic. But what is Bill Clinton's infinitely long stump speech like? Does he drop the n-word? WHO KNOWS? A liveblog of his speech, after the jump.
10: 06 -- How do you connect with the kids? Discuss the wonkier aspects of Hillary's 90-day foreclosure freeze. Bill, these kids live in dorms. Dorms don'tfreeze.
10: 07 -- "I think the '90s were pretty good myself." Ah yes, the blowjob years.
10: 08 -- Again, he is talking about food costs and inflation and tax policies. College students have food, have stable currency, and never pay taxes. College students are the biggest drag on the American economy since old people were invented.
10: 09 -- "Raise your hand if you don't have health insurance." Everyone in the press section raises two hands.
10: 10 -- Just brought up the AARP being included in Hillary's health plan. A pretty girl goes "WHOO!"
10: 10 -- Still talking about health care. Did you know that Barack doesn't have an individual mandate for universal health care, but will get every American health care? Past vs. future.
10: 12 -- If politics never worked out, Bill could've made a killing owning several used Buick/Oldsmobile dealerships on the arid bluffs of East Little Rock. He says, "How are we going to git everyone health insurance? Well I'll tell ya, now listen here: Gonna talk about premiums."
10: 14 -- No joke: "As soon as I got a little money, I became the most important person in this country to the government." He meant that he wanted to pay more taxes, but George W. Bush wouldn't let him. Still... this guy.
10: 15 -- Hillary will save more medical records on the electronic machines. This, in turn, will save every American one billion dollars.
10: 17 -- "Get rid of that No Child Left Behind act." [LOUDEST CHEERS SO FAR]. They hate this piece of legislation! They hate Ted Kennedy!
10: 19 -- Bill's like, I see lots of faces here... from all over the country... where you from girl, the Sri?... Ah, yes-sir-Sri... Marriott 224... MY WIFE FOR CONGRESS!
10: 22 -- He's giving a math problem: "Suppose you own 50 Starbucks. If 5 do something right, do we make the other 45 do other things?" Gah! We don't know when the two trains going at different speeds will crash, you Ivy League elitist!
10: 23 -- "Finally" (he said finally, finally!) "We will make college more affordable!" Now he is going on a five-point strategy -- with the numbers -- of the various minor tax creditshethe wife will institute to make this happen.
10: 25 -- Clintonism: One generally likable tax credit every four years, for America!
10: 26 -- Adopt Hillary's energy plan with... tax credits! And cuts! No, repeal the cuts... I'm Bill Clinton, wokka wokka.
10: 29 -- It's like how the iPhone -- of which all college kids own several -- reduces in cost over time. This is precisely what Hillary will do with foreign oils: watch them drop.
10: 30 -- FOREIGN POLICY!
10: 30 -- The world hates us, because of the Kyoto treaty, nukes, George W. Bush, and Hillary's two-year hawkish support for the war... I'm Bill Clinton! Watch me sparkle.
10: 32 -- "We have to get the troops out of Iraq as soon as we can." Mild applause. Probably a quarter of the students know that someone that might know someone, once, who has been to Iraq. The rest don'treallygive a shit.
10: 34 -- "John McCain wants to stay in Iraq for a hundred years," and this is bad. That is the most honest criticism of another person Bill Clinton has ever uttered.
10: 36 -- We're not having war under the Clintons!
10: 37 -- Sums up his case for Hillary: She's a "world-class change-maker."
10: 37 -- Someone's Windows XP is connected to some speaker, so there was just a loud DING over everything else -- like when you click on something, and a message appears saying, "ERROR -- VIRUS EVERYWHERE." The kids laughed.
10: 39 -- Now to "lighten things up," he's telling us how great it was to be president.
10: 40 -- Introduces a story with "I met a young woman..." One dingus in the crowd goes "uh oh."
10: 40 -- He just said "mental retardation," and how this whole family had retarded kids. Then one of the kids -- not the one that was desperately autistic -- had only "half a heart." I am not exaggerating this description at all. He is inventing the most fucked-up family in American history, on the spot.
10: 44 -- He is ending with a story about an New York policeman's account of 9/11, with the towers falling, running between debris and bodies and chaos. Politics of fear! Andrew Sullivan's favorite.
10: 45 -- Meh, he's done enough.
So it was a nice speech, with the various numbers and Southern grace. Wonkette will vote for Bill Clinton today! Tax credits of all shapes and sizes!