Jul 12, 2008 8:00 pm US/Eastern
President Clinton Speaks At Governors Conference
PHILADELPHIA (AP) ―
Former President Bill Clinton warned
Saturday that the country is becoming increasingly polarized despite the
historic nature of the Democratic primary.
Speaking at the
National Governors Association's semiannual meeting, Clinton noted that on the one hand, following
the early stages of the Democratic primary, "the surviving candidates were
an African-American man and a woman."
Clinton's wife, Hillary Rodham Clinton,
battled for the Democratic nomination into June with fellow Democrat Barack
Obama, son of a white mother and black father.
But this achievement
was overshadowed by a growing distance between Americans, said Clinton.
"Underneath this
apparent accommodation to our diversity, we are in fact hunkering down in
communities of like-mindedness, and it affects our ability to manage
difference," Clinton
said.
Clinton developed his 44-minute speech from
themes he said he drew from a new book, "The Big Sort," by Bill
Bishop.
He cited statistics
compiled by Bishop that found that in the 1976 presidential election, only 20
percent of the nation's counties voted for Jimmy Carter or President Ford by
more than a 20 percent margin.
By contrast, 48 percent
of the nation's counties in 2004 voted for John Kerry or President Bush by more
than 20 points, Clinton
said.
"We were sorting
ourselves out by choosing to live with people that we agree with," Clinton said.
Clinton has often meshed big picture
admonitions with new books whose ideas he admires. He drew similar conclusions
in 2000 following the publication of Robert Putnam's "Bowling Alone,"
on the decline of civic engagement in the United States.
Among the approximately
two dozen active governors in attendance Saturday were some of the 11 who
backed Obama over Hillary Rodham Clinton.
Gov. Timothy Kaine of Virginia said he wasn't
worried about how President Clinton might view his support for Obama.
"We're human
beings, too, so there are feelings, but we understand this is a team sport, and
we come back together as a team," Kaine said.
After weeks of not
speaking to each other, Obama last month reached out to President Clinton and
asked him for help winning the White House. Clinton had portrayed Obama as too
inexperienced to be president.
Clinton concluded his speech by reminding
governors, who are marking the association's centennial, that the issues they
face today are similar to problems President Teddy Roosevelt grappled with a
century ago.
Those include
inequality among rich and poor, immigration and energy policy.
If those issues are
dealt with, "We're about to go into the most exciting period of human
history," Clinton
said.
"If we don't, in the words of
President Roosevelt, dark will be the
future," he said. "I'm betting on light -- I hope you are, too."
(© 2008 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)
