Next to a tent featuring remote miniature stock car racing and about 50 feet from agriculture and livestock competitions sat an exhibition of a completely different variety.

On Friday the Empire Room of the New York State Fairgrounds played host to a conglomeration of Labor Union heads and state and local political representatives along with a select number of invited individuals who all gathered to listen to Sen. Hillary Clinton and her husband, former United States President Bill Clinton.

Eliot Spitzer, New York State’s attorney general, peppered his introduction of the “former attorney general of Arkansas” with jokes about Bill Clinton’s drawing power with today’s youth, specifically his daughter Sarah Beth.

“When I told her that we were going to the fair to hear the Clintons speak she said ‘That’s OK, but can we still go on the rides?’ so I guess we still have a little ways to go with the younger generation,” he said.

After his introduction, Bill Clinton countered Spitzer’s claim.

“I am not sure that it is just our children who don’t know what we do,” he said. “Hillary’s mother Dorothy is here today to see what her daughter does.”

Although he kept his comments brief before conceding the podium to his wife, Clinton touched on several topics including Sept. 11, the current economic situation and how toleration of diversity has made the United States so strong for over 200 years.

“We all have to keep in mind that no human enterprise is an unbroken line of progress and no one has the whole truth,” he said.

After the event, he elaborated on current events including the pending decision by the current president on removal of Saddam Hussein’s regime in Iraq. He said that any decision to attack needs to come only after a serious assessment of the consequences and ramifications that such the move would come with.

“If we attacked now, would it be a net increase in the security of America?,” he asked.

Clinton added that he is in an underprepared role to make a truly educated decision on the matter because he does not have the intelligence reports that the president does. Although he added that if he did have damning evidence that Hussein was planning terrorist action, he would launch an attack.

“If I knew that they were going to attack Israel next week then it would be over for me. I would do it,” he said.

Hillary’s comments, on the other hand, were focused less on the Persian Gulf and more on the Finger Lakes. She focused on a rehabilitation of the upstate region through a balance of economic revival and a push for increased tourism by protecting some of the area’s natural resources.

“Some people say ‘I want economic development’ and some say ‘I want environmental sustainability.’ Well, what I want is environmentally sensible and a sustainable economic development,” she said.

She added that thanks to the Erie Canal, upstate New York is largely responsible for the progress and success of the national economy since the early 19th century. She predicted that it is the tourism industry that will be the next big thing to come to Central New York.

“We need to get some identity and branding in our regions,” she said.

She ended her speech with optimism that the unity caused after the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11 has not only speeded along important bills in congress but also erased many lines that once divided the state of New York.

“I know that since 9/11 we have really become one state. There was no upstate or downstate or Democrat and Republican; and I think that we got more done in congress, and I think that we will continue to get more done,” she said.

Outside the Empire Room gathered a crowd that could have rivaled some of the fans of the rock stars who came to the fair this year. As the former first couple of the United States made their way through the roped off area toward the veterans memorial and newly dedicated Sept. 11 memorial, admirers clamored for a handshake or autograph.

One fan was Joyce Jewell, who was already sporting a signed Hillary Clinton shirt and a sign featuring a picture of herself with the senator during a campaign stop in Van Buren Park in 2000 with a caption reading “An Intelligent Hearing Aid.”

Although Jewell said that she admired Hillary for her stance on senior citizen rights and prescription drug coverage, there was something a little more urgent on her mind.

“I was just hoping she could sign my sign,” she said.

Published on September 2, 2002 at 12:00 pm