Bill Clinton, campaigning for Martha Coakley: "You need to take back this tea party idea"

[Amerigo Vespucci]

Friday, Jan 15, 2010 18:16 EST
Joe Conason
Clinton: Take back the Tea Party!
Stumping for Martha Coakley, the former president urges Bay State Democrats to fight GOP "abusers of power"
By Joe Conason

http://www.salon.com/news/martha_coakley/index.html?story=/opinion/conason/2010/01/15/clinton_coakley



Former President Bill Clinton, left, addresses an audience as Martha Coakley looks on during a campaign rally in Boston, Friday, Jan. 15, 2010.

When Bill Clinton flew up to Massachusetts on Friday afternoon to campaign with Martha Coakley, he brought a special message for Bay State Democrats facing the enraged right-wing activists mobilized around her opponent Scott Brown.

“You need to take back this tea party idea,” he told the wildly cheering crowds in Boston and later in Worcester. “They say that the original Boston Tea Party was anti-government, but that is wrong. The Massachusetts Bay Colony had a strong government. They weren’t liberal or conservative, they were communitarians, which means they knew we’re all in this together. What they opposed was the abuse of power.” But the aim of the Republican Party and Senate nominee Brown, he charged, is to “protect the modern abusers of power” – namely, the corporate and financial leaders whose depredations can only be curtailed by strong, responsive government.

Coakley echoed Clinton’s populist theme, accusing Brown of wanting to spare the nation’s largest banks from paying back the billions of federal bailout dollars – even while the bankers paid themselves “seven or eight-figure bonuses.” The rich and well-connected “will always be able to hire someone to speak for them. But who is going to speak for the rest of us? That is why I’m running for the Senate.”

Confessing that she wasn’t sure anyone “could fill the shoes” of the late Senator Ted Kennedy -- whose seat she and Brown are contesting in Tuesday’s special election -- Coakley said that would be her goal. “Ted Kennedy stood for the poor, the elderly, the young, the disabled,” she recalled. “Scott Brown has no interest in doing that.”

[timeforpeace]

1. Shouldn't the UN Special Envoy to Haiti be in Haiti? Heard something happened there.

[jaxx]

2. They're having trouble getting supplies out and you want the former Prez to go

in with his secret service detail and create more problems? That makes no sense.

There is a time when the bs needs to stop and this is one of them. That earthquake wasn't exactly a political event for the naysayers.

[Toots]

3. No of course not, he should be raising money and volunteers for the disaster

Asking for him to actually go to Haiti is just foolish IMO.

[Arkana]

7. That's funny--that's exactly what the wingnuts for Brown at WPI were screaming at him

as he entered the building.

[marshall]

4. I wish Bill could be part of the healthcare negotiations

Or who know, maybe he is? It's behind closed doors, so he may be a big mover in it.

[KittyWampus]

5. Great Soundbite from the master. He's best when sniping at Republicans

[Arkana]

6. I was at the one in Worcester when he said that.

He's an absolutely enthralling speaker--hell, I could listen to Clinton read the phone book and still be raptly attentive.

[msongs]

8. nice to hear at least one democratic president take on republican bull*** for a change nt