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Following her speech at the Pepsi Center on Monday night, August 25, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi Tuesday morning addressed a smaller but just as enthusiastic crowd regarding the Democratic agenda.
About 400 people heard Pelosi’s predictions if Sen. Barack Obama is elected president and her harsh remarks about Sen. John McCain at the discussion atop the Denver Athletic Club
“I wasn’t taking any hits on John McCain,” Pelosi said. “I was just speaking truth about his record. He has the experience of being wrong.”
The discussion moved quickly from McCain to Obama and what his first hundred days in office would look like if he were to secure the White House. Pelosi pointed out that one of the main differences between Obama and McCain would be their desire to work in a bipartisan manner.
“What I think that first hundred days would look like—knowing Barack Obama—it would look like a period of civility and reaching out to the Republicans,” the California Democrat said.
Pelosi also assured the crowd the first bills to come across Obama’s desk if he were to be elected President would be the State Children’s Health Insurance bill, which would insure 10,000 eligible children, and the stem cell research bill.
Both of these have strong bipartisan support just not enough to override a veto from President Bush, according to the speaker.
“These are two of our unfinished business that we could immediately send to the President’s desk that we know Barack Obama supports,” Pelosi said.
Pelosi said they have not given up passing these during the last month in their term but are prepared to get them signed by Obama if they do not accomplish that.
Pelosi discussed several issues on the domestic agenda including green technology, the elimination of dependence on foreign oil, and the war in Iraq, but she heavily stressed that the solution to many of these lies in one thing.
“The four words I want you to remember from our domestic agenda are ‘science,’ ‘science, ‘science,’ ‘science,’” Pelosi said.
Moderators Jim VandeHei of Politico.com and Susan Greene of the Denver Post broached a conversation about the close margins in the polls between Obama and McCain, but Pelosi said these only take into account the likely voters—the ones who have voted in the past two elections and are likely to vote again. They do not account for the many first-time voters who, she said, are likely to side with Obama.
When asked what the single biggest obstacle will be for Obama as he continues on his journey to the Oval Office, Pelosi said he will encounter standard campaign trials.
“The challenges he faces are the usual challenges of a campaign—how to get as many votes as possible,” Pelosi said.
Pelosi’s appearance at the Denver Athletic Club was part of the four-day Convention Conversations series, presented by the Denver Post, Politico.Com, and Yahoo News.
