Obama and Clinton's Unity Tour
BLITZER: Now we turn to the campaign trail and the return of the invisible woman. Hillary Clinton, she has been keeping a rather low profile for the past couple weeks or so. But, this Friday, Senator Clinton will appear at a rally with Barack Obama. Picture that, Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton side by side under a unity banner. It's a picture the Obama campaign is hoping is worth more than 1,000 words, more like several million votes, votes from women who used to support Hillary Clinton, and men, too. And that's just a small part of the campaign's pitch to women. Let's bring back Candy. She has got more on this story. What are you hearing, Candy?</s>CROWLEY: You know, Wolf, one of the things I'm hearing, first of all, as they're getting closer and closer here to showing the world, OK, we're united, the two of them did talk last night, I'm told by a senior source in the Obama campaign. I'm told it was a warm conversation.</s>BLITZER: Phone conversation.</s>CROWLEY: Yes, phone conversation, warm conversation, the first, as far as we know, that they have had since they had that first meeting at Dianne Feinstein's house a couple of weeks ago. So, what they're doing is kind of moving closer and closer. And of course what you know is, what Barack Obama wants is not only the support of Hillary Clinton, but the support of her supporters.</s>CROWLEY (voice-over): Apparently, there's no time for subtlety.</s>SEN. BARACK OBAMA (D-IL), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: How's it going, New Hampshire?</s>CROWLEY: Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton will campaign together for at a Unite for Change rally in Unity, New Hampshire, a town where each won 107 primary votes.</s>OBAMA: Is this all low-fat?</s>CROWLEY: The details of the joint Obama-Clinton appearance came on a female-focused day, as Obama toured a bakery in New Mexico owned by women.</s>OBAMA: These are beautiful.</s>CROWLEY: He was introduced by a state official and former Clinton supporter now in camp Obama.</s>LT. GOV. DIANE DENISH (D), NEW MEXICO: We are angry. We haven't made any progress in the last eight years. And we might be angry, but we're really smart, too.</s>CROWLEY: Obama spent over an hour outlining a litany of proposals aimed at home-and-hearth issues, including his $1,000 middle-class tax cut, up to a 50 percent tax credit for child care, double the funding for after-school programs, $10 billion more after early childhood education programs, and a requirement that employers provide seven paid six days a year.</s>OBAMA: What we spend a week in Iraq would fund all this stuff for a year, or two years, or three years, I mean, the magnitude, the scale of what we're spending at the federal government and what we're short-changing that would make a real difference in the lives of women on a day-to-day basis.</s>CROWLEY: As Obama spoke, his campaign put out a press release celebrating the 36th anniversary of Title IX, which, among other things, opened up college sports programs to women. Despite the full-court press and the "Clinton women won't vote for Obama" chatter, the numbers tell a different story. "USA Today"/Gallup found Obama with a healthy 55 percent of the female vote. That is more support from women than exit polls showed for John Kerry and on a par with Al Gore and Bill Clinton. In fact, Obama's more significant problem is among another key Clinton well of support, seniors. Obama draws about 43 percent of voters over 65 in a recent CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll. That is well below that of previous Democratic contenders. It's not small item. About one in five voters is over 65. And in the past quarter-century, every nominee who won seniors also won the popular vote.</s>BLITZER: Interesting. Candy, I know you have been working your sources. A lot of negotiation, I take it, leading up to this unity event this week?</s>CROWLEY: Always. But it seems to have been a staff-to-staff kind of negotiation, because, again, the two of them talked for the first time since the Feinstein meeting last night on the phone. There are several outstanding issues. As you know, they are going to appear at a fund-raiser behind closed doors, but she's...</s>BLITZER: Here in Washington.</s>CROWLEY: Here in Washington. She is going to bring her fund- raisers in and introduce them to Obama. There has been some grumbling that I have heard from some of those major fund-raisers for Clinton, who feel like they really haven't been reached out to; they have been a little bit dissed. So, that's a really important session for Barack Obama. Again, they need to work out the problem of her debt. She is willing, I am told, to take up her portion of the debt -- that is the money that she lent the campaign -- but, obviously, they would like some help with the roughly $10 million that is left over. As far as I can tell, at least as of yesterday, that had yet to be worked out.</s>BLITZER: I suspect that Barack Obama will be very nice to those Clinton fund-raisers when they get together on Thursday.</s>CROWLEY: You think?</s>BLITZER: Joe, Joe Klein, if you take at Hillary Clinton, she is doing all the things as far as the Obama campaign is concerned, but what about her husband? That would be the former president of the United States. He was asked yesterday about endorsing Obama, simply walked past some reporters. He did offer a tepid statement about Obama when he met with the conference of mayors down in Florida yesterday. Listen to what he said.</s>BILL CLINTON, FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I think we will get better national policy next year. Because I believe so strongly in this, I favored Senator Obama's position, which is to go to 80 percent reduction in greenhouse gases, over Senator McCain's position, which is to go to 70. But the point is, that's lightyears ahead of where the Republicans have been.</s>BLITZER: All right, what do you think? What's taking Bill Clinton so long?</s>KLEIN: Well, I think he's pretty embittered. He blew up at the end of the campaign at the press. He's very angry at us. But I think he's doing the right thing, which is staying out of the news. But you have got to say that those comments yesterday were pretty grudging.</s>BLITZER: I think you're right. I assume eventually he will do it. But let's see how long that takes. Leslie...</s>KLEIN: Oh, he will give a stirring speech at the convention, no doubt.</s>BLITZER: If he's invited. You assume he is going to be invited, right?</s>BLITZER: OK. I'm being sarcastic.</s>BLITZER: All right. Leslie, let's talk about McCain's efforts to reach out to some of those Hillary Clinton women who are so bitterly disappointed she didn't get the Democratic nomination. Does he have a shot, you think, of getting a significant number of them?</s>SANCHEZ: Oh, absolutely, for a lot of different reasons. One, you have a lot of women who are very upset and feel bitter about the fact that maybe Hillary Clinton conceded and endorsed and is jumping on the bandwagon a little too soon. They haven't let a lot of those feelings heal. They're still sore about a lot of that. But also look at the fact there's a "Cook Report"/R.T. Strategies poll that shows that Senator McCain has 13 percent of Democratic women. He was hovering at 16, 17 percent a year ago. He's still doing incredible well. You have a lot of weak Democrats who are looking at economic issues, health care, and really his stand on national security.</s>BLITZER: What do you think, Candy? Do you think he has got a shot at getting some of those women?</s>CROWLEY: They always have a shot. But, look, female voters have been tough for Republicans. I mean, generally, white men vote for Republicans, and white women tend to vote for Democrats. So, it's always been an uphill climb. And I still think you look at those numbers, and Barack Obama is in a pretty good position, at least when you look at the arithmetic.</s>BLITZER: What do you think, Joe?</s>KLEIN: Well, I think that the real problems here for Obama aren't women. As Candy said before, the bifurcation is between young and old. And I think he has a real problem with Latino voters.</s>BLITZER: I think you make a good point. All right, guys, stand by. We have much more to talk about, including what Karl Rove said today about Barack Obama. You might be surprised to hear this and what the Obama campaign is doing to fight right back. Also, more controversial comments from the shock jock Don Imus. He said something today that has got him in hot water all over again -- that story and much more coming up.