Serving Boone, Blowing Rock, Banner Elk, and other towns of the North Carolina High Country
Founded 05-05-05

Clinton Makes a Campaign Stop at Westglow

Story by Kathleen McFadden

Bill Clinton was running late on Tuesday afternoon, but none of the people at Westglow Resort and Spa seemed to mind. Clinton was scheduled to appear at 2:00 at a $500 per person fundraiser for Senator Hillary Clinton, but Westglow owner Bonnie Schaefer announced well after 2:00 that the President’s driver had somehow ended up at Yonahlossee. The assembled guests chuckled and continued their conversations, and Clinton’s car pulled up soon after.

When Clinton arrived, he commented on the Highway 321 widening project. “There’s a lot of highway construction going on,” he said. “It was so bad at one place, I got out and made a few votes among the road workers.”

During his address, Clinton commented on Senator Clinton’s successes over the past seven weeks, pointing particularly to her win in Pennsylvania. “The people who knew they needed a president voted for her,” Clinton said, and he talked about the $1 million dollars Clinton raised over the Internet after the Pennsylvania primary. “Some of the notes would make you cry,” he said, like the one from a supporter who said he would send the campaign $5 a week and go without lunch.

While acknowledging that Indiana and North Carolina [both with primaries on May 6] had not looked favorable for her, “all the polls now have her even,” Clinton said, “and it appears to me she has a wonderful base in North Carolina. I feel she’s in a position to do well here and may have a win here.”

Clinton outlined six talking points he urged attendees to discuss with their friends to try to persuade them to vote for Senator Clinton: her jobs policy, her plan to deal with the home mortgage crisis, her healthcare policy, her education policy, her fiscal conservatism and her plans for withdrawal from Iraq. Throughout his enumeration of Senator Clinton’s positions, former President Clinton discussed the differences between the country’s economic situation when he left office and the current conditions.

“I believe it’s not close who would be the best president,” Clinton said, “and I believe enough people in North Carolina can be persuaded. Don’t you believe for a minute that she can’t win this thing….Tell people—folks who need a president—to send her $10 on the Internet. That’s what’s keeping her going.

“There’s no question in my mind that she’s the most electable candidate,” Clinton said, “but first we have to get her over the finish line….We need her to be validated here, and it’s in your hands.”