Joseph Gerth

Opinion Columnist | Louisville Courier Journal

Hillary Clinton came to Louisville on Tuesday with a message more suited for a general election campaign against Republican Donald Trump than a primary contest against Bernie Sanders.

During a 32-minute speech at Louisville Slugger Field, the former secretary of state, senator and First Lady took shots at Trump over his comments on foreign policy, words about women and insults of those who disagree with him.

“You could not imagine a more different vision for our country than the one between our side, of Democrats for progress, for prosperity, for fairness and opportunity than the presumptive nominee on the Republican side,” she told the crowd.

The visit was Clinton’s second to Kentucky in recent weeks and comes just two days before her husband, former President Bill Clinton, is scheduled to make stops in Owensboro, Frankfort and Prestonsburg.

She was met by protesters who stood outside a door that opens onto Main Street, who were chanting "Hey, hey, ho, ho, Hillary Clinton's got to go." Some were holding signs blaming her for the tough times faced by the coal industry in Kentucky.

Before she took the stage, security personnel closed the doors and erected a black curtain so protesters couldn't see or shout in.

Clinton used the event to lay out her plan for the nation and to attack Trump, her likely opponent in November.

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Stealing a page out of her husband’s playbook, she focused repeatedly on pocketbook issues and told her supporters that people do better under Democratic presidents than Republican ones.

Bill Clinton's 1992 campaign had the unofficial mantra, "It's the economy, stupid," underscoring the need to focus on the nation's economic woes.

“I’ll tell you, it’s a historical fact, the economy does better when we have a Democrat in the White House,” she said. “All you have to do is look at the record of the last two Democratic presidents to get all the evidence you need.”

She said that 23 million jobs were created during Bill Clinton’s two terms and the economy improved under Barack Obama after it tanked at the end of President George W. Bush’s eight years in office.

“We don’t want incomes to rise just for some, we want them to rise for everybody, not just people at the top,” she said. “And when Bill was president, that is what happened. … Everybody did better.”

And she blamed the GOP for the recession that struck the country early in the 21st century. “There’s an easy answer for that. We had a Republican president.”

She called for infrastructure improvements as a way to get more people back to work and focusing on bringing manufacturing jobs back by giving tax breaks to companies that employ people here.

Clinton pushed for other Democratic positions, including raising the minimum wage, equal pay for women, preserving abortion rights and gay marriage and overturning the court case known as Americans United, which allowed corporations to spend money on federal elections.

She called for focusing on alternative energy and trying to deal with climate change – and in doing so appeared to toss a barb at Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, who said during his 2014 re-election campaign that he didn’t know if global warming is real because he isn’t a scientist.

“I love it when the Republicans are asked, ‘What do you think about climate change?’ and they all say something like, ‘I don’t know. I’m not a scientist.’ I’ve been saying for months, ‘Well, go talk to a scientist,’” she said.

She called for more early childhood education and debt-free college. “The reason we can do this is because we can invest in the education of young people from middle-class, working poor families.”

That was the only time she mentioned Sanders, who trails her by 774 delegates with time running out before the Democratic National Convention in July.

“I don’t believe in free college for the wealthy. I don’t support that,” she said. “My opponent, Sen. Sanders, does. We just have a difference. But he also requires that a third of the cost for free college be paid by the states.

“Now, I don’t know about you, but it doesn’t seem like your new governor’s real friendly to higher education,” she said.

Clinton called for reducing student loan interest rates, said she will “defend the Affordable Care Act” and said she is saddened that Gov. Matt Bevin wants to do away with the state's kynect health insurance exchange and scale back the state’s Medicaid expansion.

“It’s so distressing to me when anybody in public life … who has all the health care he or she needs wants to take it away from poor people, working-poor people, small-business people and others who don’t have the health care they need,” she said.

“I’m hoping maybe your governor will come out with a plan that doesn’t strip away the health insurance that hundreds of Kentuckians now have. I sure hope that’s the case because that’s the kind of country we should be striving to be,’ Clinton said.

Clinton saved her attacks on Trump for near the end of her speech, calling his comments on foreign policy “reckless.”

“He just kind of throws things out and people say, maybe he doesn’t really mean it,” she said. “When you are running for and serving as president, you’d better mean what you say. So when he says he doesn’t care if more countries get nuclear weapons, I shudder.”

She criticized him for statements suggesting the U.S. should pull out of the United Nations and for saying that we should allow Russia or Iranians to go after ISIS.

And Clinton called him out for his attacks on others. “We can’t be scapegoating, and finger-pointing and blaming, and demeaning and, degrading and insulting our fellow Americans,” she said. “That is not what we are, and it’s time that we said ‘enough.’”

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