Dodd in QC
Tuesday, November 13th, 2007 11:17 am(11:20 a.m.) Chris Dodd was in Bettendorf last night to court the union vote. Harold Schaitberger, the president of the International Association of Firefighters.
About three dozen people gave Dodd a listen, but it was one of the smaller crowds we’ve seen so far.
In Bettendorf, Dodd spoke forcefully about what wanted to do — and,.importantly, how he’d do it. He said he’d institute the Employee Free Choice Act by executive order if Congress didn’t act. He rejected an increase in the retirement age for Social Security and backed a carbon tax to deal with global warming. He also said he’d work with Republicans to get things done and presented a laundry list of past bi-partisan accomplishments.
Dodd is positioning himself as the gray hair (or in this case, white hair) with experience and results. Big example: The Family and Medical Leave Act. Others have claimed credit. Dodd was the chief sponsor in the Senate and talks about working on it for years.
While here he also expressed some irritation with other candidates in the race, but he didn’t name names.
He complained of candidates “skulking” around the floor of the Senate not casting votes until a rival does — a clear reference to Sens. Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. And at one point he joked there were no plants in the audience asking questions, another reference to Clinton and the admission by her campaign that staffers had prompted audience members to ask her questions.
He did get a question from a supporter who was piped in by conference call, but a staffer on site quickly noted the connection.
I asked Dodd later if he was going to try to boost his position in Iowa by going after the others, much as Obama said he’d do with Clinton. Dodd said that’s not his style, though, his staff took Clinton to task yesterday on a trade issue and this morning Dodd put out a statement criticizing John Edwards for not pledging to back the party’s presidential nominee, whoever it is.