Kerry Compares Bush to Depression-Era Leader

Racing across the nation’s Rust Belt on Saturday, Sen. John F. Kerry compared President Bush to Herbert Hoover and scoffed at his statement that America’s economy was “turning the corner.”

At a rain-soaked rally outside a scenic railway station here in southwestern Pennsylvania, the Democratic presidential nominee sought to undercut Bush’s case that tax cuts were producing jobs in economically strapped regions such as this.

“Turning the corner,” Kerry said in a tone of disbelief, mocking remarks that Bush made Friday in Missouri and Michigan as the competing candidates set off in a burst of campaigning after the Democratic National Convention.

“The last time we had a president who talked about turning a corner and ran on the slogan of turning a corner was Herbert Hoover,” Kerry said, referring to the Republican who was in office when the Great Depression began in 1929.

“I don’t want to run talking about turning a corner. I’m running to climb the mountain and get to the top,” Kerry shouted to the 4,000 people who filled the station square and nearby streets.

The Massachusetts senator’s attack on Bush’s economic agenda, and promotion of his own, came on the second day of a two-week trip crossing the nation by bus, train, boat and airplane. His caravan of buses, vans, sport-utility vehicles and police cars rolled across the lush, green hills of Pennsylvania to West Virginia and Ohio.

Underscoring the region’s pivotal role in the race, Bush campaigned in the same three swing states Saturday.

In an effort to chip away at any advantage Bush may have among hunters, Kerry stressed his support of gun rights at a time when Republicans are publicizing the F rating given Kerry by the National Rifle Assn.

“I’ve been a hunter since I was about 12 years old, and I went through the whole progression. You know -- BB gun to .22, .33,” said Kerry, who on previous campaign stops hunted pheasant in Iowa and shot clay pigeons in Wisconsin.

He blended his appeal to hunters with a call for stronger environmental protection.

“If you’re a true hunter and a true sportsman, you protect the habitats so there’s something there to hunt and fish, and that’s exactly what we’re going to do,” Kerry said.

On foreign policy, Kerry invoked religion, saying God put just 3% of the world’s oil under American soil.

“That’s all God gave us,” he said. “I think he sent us a message when he did that. And the message is: If we want to control our own security and hold our destiny in our own hands, then I want America’s energy to depend on our innovation and our ingenuity, not the Saudi royal family.”

With running mate Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina at his side, Kerry renewed his pledge to invest in alternative fuel technologies to reduce U.S. dependence on foreign oil.

Campaigning with the Democratic ticket were the candidates’ wives, Teresa Heinz Kerry and Elizabeth Edwards, along with several of their grown children. Lending Hollywood panache to the group for the second day was actor Ben Affleck, who took an increasingly visible role Saturday after a week of promoting Kerry on television at the convention in Boston.

At the rally in Greensburg, Affleck was the only one in the group not wearing a rain jacket. “He’s standing out here in his T-shirt to show how macho he is,” Kerry joked to the crowd.

Kerry’s campaign swing has been drawing crowds of 5,000 and more at its stops. “It was four hours in the rain, but it was worth it,” said Paula Olivero, 50, a Slippery Rock University administrator who attended the Greensburg rally. “I believe in what Kerry says, things like making responsible decisions about going to war.”

In Pennsylvania and West Virginia, Kerry’s remarks on Iraq drew sustained cheers. In Wheeling, W.Va., Kerry promised to restore America’s ties with allies, cut war costs, “take the target off American troops, and get them home -- with honor -- as soon as possible.”

A crowd of 7,000 in Wheeling gathered in a park on the banks of the Ohio River. Behind them was the Delta Queen riverboat, its balconies festooned with red, white and blue bunting.

Van Halen’s rock anthem “Right Now” blasted from loudspeakers as Edwards and Affleck, followed by Kerry, made a grand entrance through the throng. Union members -- steelworkers, teachers and firefighters -- waved signs.

West Virginia has lost 10,000 manufacturing jobs since January 2001, when Bush took office.

Kerry raised the specter of laid-off Americans “forced to unbolt the equipment” they had worked with and “pack it in a crate marked ‘China.’ ” He renewed his vow to abolish tax breaks for companies that send jobs overseas.

“If anything is enough to make somebody tear their hair out and get angry, it’s the notion that they’re actually subsidizing the loss of their own job,” he said.

In Pennsylvania, down 158,000 manufacturing jobs during Bush’s term, Kerry pressed his case for the need to improve the economy as he disputed the president’s assertion that America’s economy was “turning the corner.”

“Let me ask you,” Kerry called to the crowd, “if you’re one of those 44 million Americans who doesn’t have any health insurance, and you have no prospect of buying any, are you turning the corner?”

“No!” the crowd yelled back.