Clinton makes a plea for unity

It was evident that Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, campaigning for her Democratic primary rival here Friday, was speaking to a crowd still lukewarm toward Sen. Barack Obama.

Some cars in the parking lot had “Hillary ‘08” bumper stickers, and a few even championed presumed Republican nominee Sen. John McCain. The tables outside the Green Valley High School gymnasium peddled Obama T-shirts and buttons, but some offered hats that said “Hillary.”

“I’m going to vote for Obama, but I want Hillary to tell me why,” said Kathy Dougherty, 54, of Las Vegas. “For a while he was the enemy, so I need a little help.”

In her first solo campaign appearance for Obama, in a state where she got the most Democratic caucus votes, Clinton asked the spirited crowd to “work as hard and fight as hard” for the presumed Democratic nominee as they had for her.

“We started on two separate paths, but we’re on one journey now,” Clinton told a few hundred supporters as an Obama banner behind her touted, “Change We Can Believe In.”

McCain and President Bush, Clinton said, are “like two sides of the same coin, and that doesn’t amount to a whole lot of change.”

Clinton’s 20-minute speech capped a week of acrimony over the role her supporters will play at this month’s Democratic National Convention, where both the New York senator and her husband, former President Clinton, are scheduled to speak.

Sen. Clinton suggested in a video posted on YouTube that letting her backers cheer for her might prove “cathartic,” though some worry that it will showcase a Democratic Party divided.

“She’ll have a huge effect on whether [Obama] gets the support of her followers,” said Dennis Dunn, 52, of Las Vegas, who attended Clinton’s speech. “We’re very devoted and very sad.”

On Friday, Clinton made a strong plea for unity by linking Obama to some of her signature issues: reforming healthcare, backing child-care tax credits, raising the minimum wage and demanding pay equity for women.

She reassured supporters that her marathon primary battle with Obama showed “his passion, his determination, his grace and his grit.”

After the speech, Rachel Jones, 21, of Boulder City, Nev., said she appreciated Clinton’s “wholehearted support” of Obama. “Her eyes were brighter, she had bigger hand gestures, it was more passionate. Before she was a little tepid,” Jones said.

Jones has been fretting that Democratic Party infighting could keep Obama from winning the White House. “I know that we can come together if we keep having events like this,” she said.

Obama was off the campaign trail, arriving in his native Hawaii on Friday for a vacation.

McCain met Friday with former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee before a fundraiser in Rogers, Ark. Huckabee has been mentioned as a possible running mate who could bring in Christian conservatives wary of McCain. At the fundraiser, McCain said Huckabee “has earned a very large role in the future of the Republican Party.”

Earlier in the day the Arizona Republican campaigned at the Iowa State Fair, where he told corn farmers that he would help them increase their exports but repeated that he opposed subsidies for ethanol.

“My friends, we will disagree on a specific issue and that’s healthy,” he said. “I don’t believe in ethanol subsidies, but I believe in renewable fuels.”

McCain’s stand against federal subsidies has made him unpopular enough that he avoided campaigning in Iowa, the first presidential nominating contest in the nation and a traditional launching pad for candidates. He skipped the state’s caucuses in 2000 as well as this year.

In a briefing with reporters, McCain responded to the Russian military incursion into the Georgian republic of South Ossetia by reiterating his call for Russia to be expelled from the Group of 8 leading industrialized nations. “Russia should not be in the G-8. And, by the way, continued Russian behavior . . . indicates that Russia is moving further and further from the principles and values and ideals of the G-8.”

At a fundraiser in Des Moines, McCain seemed to lower supporters’ expectations of how he will match up against Obama.

“I know, by the way, and you know, that Sen. Obama will give a great speech at their convention before 75,000 people in Denver. And I don’t expect to match up to that. And in the debates, I expect him to do extremely well. He’s very, very good.

“But I think it’s going to be substance that matters. And I think it’s going to be vision for America, and I think it’s going to be concrete plans of action. But don’t underestimate the challenges we face.”

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ashley.powers@latimes.com

Times staff writer Bob Drogin in Arkansas contributed to this report.