It’s Economy…
Washington Prism
Denver, CO – The economy was the main theme of Day Two at the Democratic National Convention, with speakers ranging from an unemployed and indebted textile worker from North Carolina, a victim of the Iowa flood, union representatives and a number of Congressmen and Senators from some of the states that have been hit the hardest by the crisis. And of course Hillary Clinton, who made the economy one of the central issues of her primary campaign..jpg)
The recession is by far the biggest worry for most Democrats in Denver. “I would say the economy is pretty lousy,” Anne Hatfield said. Anne is a delegate and a retired senior from Pennsylvania who has been witnessing the impact of rising prices of food and gas on her life and that of her community. “The state of the economy is horrible,” Tiffany Powers agreed. An African-American lawyer and delegate from North Carolina Tiffany explained: “I come from a rural community that relied heavily on the textile industry. But now our plants have closed, jobs have been shipped overseas, people lost their homes.” She believes that middle-class Democrats would want a tax-cut and better public education from President Obama. read more
“The economy is definitely the most important issue today,” Angie Cruise, a political analyst from Tempe, Arizona said. “There have been a huge number of foreclosures in my community. And then I speak with people every day who tell me they have to choose between food and medicines,” Ms. Cruise added. Democrats want a stable economy, Angie believes, where they can find a job and stay in their homes. And they would want better health care and more investments in public schools. 
Beyond the delegates, a large crowd of politically active Democrats flocked Denver to attend the DNC. “Everything is more expensive,” Lynda Clark from Maryland told me, “while salaries are not keeping up with the spike in prices.” Ms. Clark is a single woman who works in public broadcasting in Washington DC and is in Denver because the Obama campaign decided to reward her many months of volunteering with a ticket to the Pepsi Center. “My daughter is in college up in Massachusetts. She is at a state school, but even state schools these days are not that cheap,” Ms. Clark continues. Her daughter is working to help support herself and has taken out loans to pay for her studies: “She is going to graduate soon and she will be in debt. And so will I, since I also gave her money to put her through school.”
Donors are also among the thousands of guests, and probably some of the most important. Brett Hughes, an investments manager from Oklahoma, came here at the invitation of the party that wanted to thank him for his contributions. “Personally I’ve done extremely well in recent years,” Mr. Hughes said, “but I very well know that for most people the economy is a problem.”
He says he came here to help support the change that Sen. Obama promises as President: “Obama needs to have people like me paying higher taxes,” concluded Mr. Hughes, expressing no doubts about Sen Obama's promise to raise taxes for rich Americans.
