4,000 cheer Clinton at Temple rally

With a full six weeks to go before the Pennsylvania primary, Sen. Hillary Clinton drew nearly 4,000 standing, shouting, chanting supporters to a rally on the Temple University campus last night.

A clearly energized Clinton gave a rousing populist speech that hammered President Bush and didn't include some pointed attacks she'd leveled earlier in the day at her rival, Sen. Barack Obama.

"It took a Clinton to clean up after the first Bush. It's going to take a Clinton to clean up after the second Bush!" Clinton said in the biggest applause line of the Temple event.

In a noon speech in Harrisburg, Clinton accused Obama of voting for Vice President "Dick Cheney and his energy bill" with "tax subsidies and giveaways" for oil companies.

"When you think about what we have to do . . . it's not going to happen just by saying, 'Don't we all agree?' We're going to have to fight to make the changes against the special interests that dominate Washington," Clinton said according to a campaign news release.

Obama campaign spokesman Bill Burton responded in a statement that the 2005 energy bill Obama voted for raised taxes on oil companies and invested in alternative energy.

Burton accused Clinton of employing "the same old attack politics that Americans have already rejected across the country."

The crowd that nearly filled McGonigle Hall on Broad Street was mostly white, diverse in age, and had more women than men, but was almost uniformly juiced for their candidate.

Speaking of the need to control soaring oil prices, Clinton said, "Let's investigate the oil companies and the oil-producing countries, because I don't think this is on the level . . . this is not a free market, they set the prices!"

Clinton promised a tough policy on Saudi Arabia, which she noted was the home country of most of the 9/11 hijackers.

"You will not see me as the president of the United States holding hands with the Saudis," Clinton said. "I'm going to hold them accountable!"

Clinton's Philadelphia event completed a swing through central and eastern Pennsylvania that included a stop in Scranton yesterday.

Waiting to get into Temple yesterday, Lynn Alexander and Joanne Bliss both said that they liked Clinton's leadership qualities and that the prospect of electing the first woman president played no role in their decisions.

"She's ever so bright," Bliss said. "She's got more b---- than most people. She knows how to use the system, and we need her."

The Pennsylvania primary is April 22. *