A.G. Gancarski
On Wednesday, former President Bill Clinton graced Jacksonville with his presence at Hillary Clinton‘s campaign office opening.
Ahead of the event, some media sources were told it was closed to media … yet, in what some might call classically Clintonian prevarication, other media was in the house at the Southside Jacksonville locale.
Clinton got a rapturous reception as he entered the room to the strains of “Happy,” the official job-creation theme of the Rick Scott administration.
Clinton talked of the choice in the election.
“If we have not learned anything from Orlando, Minnesota, Baton Rouge and Dallas … however justified someone’s rage is … it’s a terrible way to run a country,” Clinton said, adding “we are interdependent.”
Clinton then focused on Dallas, lauding the city for “community policing” and training people “not to overreact.” Yet someone “singled them out because it was convenient,” Clinton said of the sniper in Dallas who killed five police officers.
“We are in this together,” Clinton said, and the election is about “defining the terms of our togetherness.”
“Why do we have to settle for ‘Making America Great Again,’ — which is code for ‘I’ll give you the economy you had 40 or 50 years ago,” Clinton asked, and a paradigm that excludes minorities and women.
Clinton then contrasted America now to the Trump motif.
“If you think we’re stronger together, Hillary’s your candidate,” Clinton said.
“If you’re the ‘wall’ person, you’ve got a candidate and she’s not it,” Clinton added.
“I’ve spent a lifetime trying to help people get their kids a decent education, trying to solve problems in America and around the world … we are the best-positioned country in the world by far, because of our youth and diversity and our assets … but we’ve got to pick someone with the right ideas and the right values to do that,” Clinton continued.
“Hillary has offered us a vision and specifics,” Clinton said, regarding Mrs. Clinton’s infrastructure plan.
“Providing affordable broadband in rural areas will bring everyone into the national economy … there are millions of jobs, just waiting there unclaimed,” Clinton continued.
“We’re going to grow together, or drift apart with grievous consequences,” Clinton said.
“We are on the cusp of the greatest era of shared prosperity in history if we make the right choice,” Clinton said, not acknowledging $20 trillion of national debt and $100 trillion in unfunded federal liabilities.
Instead, he kept the message binary, contrasting the politics of “resentment” from Trump, with the vision expressed by Mrs. Clinton’s campaign.
Clinton, on multiple occasions, referred to the issues in “coal country,” even as the new Clinton headquarters is within walking distance from some of the most distressed neighborhoods on Jacksonville’s Southside, which have issues with poverty, blight, crime, and associated social maladies.
But the event wasn’t about granular policy analysis. It was about big picture narrative, in which Mr. Clinton described the presumptive Democratic nominee as a “change-maker,” reprising themes he’d used previously in Jacksonville, addressing a crowd in Northwest Jacksonville ahead of the Florida primary.
The crowd ate it up with a spoon. And when Clinton predicted that “if she wins Florida, she will be the next president,” applause filled the room.
At least as far as I could tell via the Periscope feed.
