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'Ballot Bowl '08'

Aired February 14, 2008 - 12:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

CANDY CROWLEY, CNN SR. POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Hi and welcome to CNN's "Ballot Bowl," the Thursday edition.
I'm Candy Crowley, coming to you live from Chicago, Illinois, the home base of Democrat Barack Obama.

This is your chance. You will be hearing from these candidates, sometimes live, sometimes taped. But all of it unfiltered.

Taking a look at game plan this hour, John McCain right now is holding a rally in Burlington, Vermont, while his chief rival, Mike Huckabee, is trumping through Madison, Wisconsin.

Joining me are my colleagues, Dana Bash, who is with John McCain at that rally, and Jessica Yellin, with the Clinton campaign in Columbus, Ohio.

Want to start with Dana.

DANA BASH, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Candy.

And John McCain is actually right behind me finishing a quick news conference with reporters. So let's listen in to that.

SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R-AZ), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I think Governor Douglas has proven that he is a governor who has practiced unity, he's reached across the aisle. He's been very successful as governor. And obviously I think he would be part of our team. Exactly what role he would want to stay -- whether stay as governor of Vermont, or do other things, I think -- but I'm grateful for his support and I consider him a great leader and a great governor.

Go ahead.

QUESTION: (OFF-MIKE)

MCCAIN: Yes, sir, I do.

QUESTION: (OFF-MIKE)

MCCAIN: Well, I have fought for human rights all of my life. I know what it's like to be without human rights.

I have fought in desperate issues ranging from Darfur to what I think is the world's greatest and noblest person, Aung San Suu Kyi in Burma. And I will continue to do -- continue my long record of advocacy for human rights, and that applies to the unborn, as well as the born.

I thank you very much.

Thank you.

BASH: And that's John McCain wrapping up a quick press conference with reporters here in Burlington, Vermont, right after he had his first rally he's had in quite some time, his first rally certainly since sweeping the Potomac primaries on Tuesday. And you can hear in his speech here what you have been seeing in some of his press conferences back in Washington over the past couple of days, and that is John McCain starting to test-drive his message against his Democratic opponents in November. But he's also made a point here in Burlington to talk about a Republican who is still in this race.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MCCAIN: First of all, I'd like to say, as you know, Governor Huckabee is still in this race. I respect his candidacy, and I respect his continued participation in this race. And I will respect that and we will continue to campaign hard.

I will also campaign hard, if we are fortunate enough to get the nomination, all over this country. I will take my campaign everywhere in the United States of America if I am the nominee of the party.

My friends, I will not concede a single vote or a single state to my opponent, because I believe that the United States of America is going to have -- is going to have the opportunity -- the opportunity to have a very stark differences in philosophy and view of the role of government. I am -- proudly stand before you as a conservative Republican that believes in less government, lower taxes, less regulation, that families make decisions on health care and not government. And I can provide this nation security, and I have the experience and knowledge and background.

(APPLAUSE)

So -- so we will have stark differences. That debate will be respectful. But there is no doubt in my mind that we have a difference between either Senator Clinton and Senator Obama and myself.

I want to lower your taxes. They want to raise your taxes.

I want to have less government, and they want more government. They believe that government is the solution to your problem. I believe that the ingenuity, innovation and the individual strength of America lies with the family and small businesses across America and across Vermont.

I believe -- I believe that this nation faces a transcendent threat of radical Islamic extremism. And I believe that my knowledge, my experience, my background and my judgment qualifies me to take on that with no on-the-job training.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BASH: No on-the-job training. That's a not-so-subtle dig, of course, at Barack Obama, who is not only nearly 30 years John McCain's junior, but obviously a first-term senator, as opposed to John McCain. The point he was trying to make there, he has been in the United States Congress for 24 years.

One other quick note as to what John McCain was talking about here in Burlington. He's seizing on a new report out today that shows how many so-called pork barrel projects are earmarked, senators have gotten for their home states and districts. And he made the point and reminded people that on his it was zero.

And that is really a signature issue for John McCain, his fight against pork barrel spending. But he not only talked about his zero on the ledger, but about Hillary Clinton getting more than $300 million in pork barrel projects, and also the fact, he said, that Barack Obama got in the $90 million range. But he made the point twice here, twice, that Barack Obama will not disclose the earmarks from the two other years that he has been in the United States Senate, saying that if he is somebody who wants transparency, he needs to prove it. So, a real direct hit at Barack Obama on his transparency on that issue.

Now, we talked about Mike Huckabee, and you heard John McCain talk about the fact that he still respects the fact that Mike Huckabee is in this race for president. He is still his Republican rival.

Mike Huckabee is campaigning as we speak in Madison, Wisconsin, so we want to bring you some of that now live.

(JOINED IN PROGRESS)

MIKE HUCKABEE (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: ... and everybody just has to -- you know, I mean, it's a buzz even if you're from Arkansas to get to walk out there on the field.

So I go to the security guy, and I say to him, I say, "Guy, do me a favor." I said, "Don't argue with me or ask me why, just do me a favor. I want you to ask me and these other two governors to sing the National Anthem."

And he looked at me, and he said, "What?" I said, "Don't -- no, no, no, no, no. I told you, don't ask any questions. I just gave you a simple instruction. Invite us to sing the National Anthem."

He said, "OK. Would you guys sing the National Anthem?" I said, "We'd be delighted."

So I got Dirk Kempthorne and Mike Rounds, and we went down and stood on the 50 yard line at Lambeau Field at 11:15 at night and sung our lungs out the National Anthem.

(APPLAUSE)

So -- now, Dirk wasn't too bad a singer. Mike Rounds is horrible. And he told me he was, and he wasn't kidding.

But when it was over I said, "Now, guys, I want you to go back to your states and tell all the constituents of your state that while you were out campaigning you were invited to sing the National Anthem at Lambeau Field on the 50 yard line. They don't have to know that there wasn't a soul in the stadium but the security guard, and that it was 11:15 at night."

So I want you to know how great it is to be back in Wisconsin, and a whole lot more people are here than were to hear me sing the National Anthem at Lambeau Field. And, boy, am I glad.

(APPLAUSE)

And let me tell you something, you need to be glad that I'm not singing the National Anthem today.

I've got a different song I want to talk to you about today. It's a song about our party and our future as a country.

And I'm concerned about it, because I almost think that if we're not careful, we're going to be drifting away from the very things that made us strong as a nation. The strength of our nation has never been in government, headquartered in Washington. In fact, if there is anything that's really weak about our country today, it's that Washington is so completely polarized that it's become paralyzed. We are not seeing solutions coming out of Washington.

Is it of any interest to you that I'm the only person still on my feet running for president who is not from there, the only person who is not a part of that entire system that has gone wrong?

(APPLAUSE)

That I'm the only person that's actually been the chief executive of a state and has had to run things and balance the budget and make things work? Senators don't have to make things work. They get to vote on a few things every year. But they're not really responsible for whether it makes it or breaks it.

When you've been the chief executive, as I was for 10 and a half years as a governor, every day you make decisions that decide whether we have more jobs or fewer jobs, whether taxes are higher or lower, whether our highways are better or worse, whether the unemployment rate goes up or goes down, whether middle class people have a chance to do better or stay stagnant, or do worse. Whether health care is more accessible and affordable, whether education is really a chance for a kid to excel and do great in life or whether it's just another roadblock in his path to never getting out of the hole. Whether our prison system just warehouses people by the tens of thousands at the taxpayers' expense, or it really does help us to keep the people that we're really, really absolutely afraid of locked up so we can live our lives in safer streets and neighborhoods.

Every day decisions have to be made for which have huge consequences for the people. And a president's got to do that. A governor, in essence, manages a microcosm of the federal government. All those agencies that you have at the federal level are exactly what you have at the state level.

And so the day you first walk into the Oval Office as president, you don't have to learn what the Labor Department does or what the Health and Human Services Department does because you have run one of those. You've dealt with all of those issues out there, and you understand what impact decisions have on families trying to put food on the table. And one of the reasons that we've got a lot of problems in this country is because there are people who are living in the bubble of Washington, D.C., that don't have a clue about how you live every day.

Now, folks, next Tuesday when you go to vote in Wisconsin, one of two things will happen -- either you will make enough noise about your selection and your choice to say hold on just a minute, don't forget the values of the heartland of America, or you could become part of the "me too" herd mentality that is beginning to take shape from the beltway and beyond that just says, let's have a coronation.

The reason we can't afford a coronation is because if we lose a choice we lose a voice. And the voice that needs to be heard is a voice for small business owners.

There needs to be a voice for those families who choose to educate their kids at home, or educate their kids in a private school, or those who make decisions to put their kids in a public school but want the public school to be worth putting their kids into. That's what we have to be able to say.

BASH: And that's Mike Huckabee on the first of a two-day campaign swing through the state of Wisconsin. Wisconsin holds its Republican primary next Tuesday.

Mike Huckabee, a very defiant Mike Huckabee, insisting he is staying in this race despite the fact that it is now mathematically impossible for him to get the Republican nomination unless, of course, something unexpected changes, which given the way this race is going, you never know, that could happen. And that's Mike Huckabee again speaking in Wisconsin.

I'm going to throw it back to my colleague, who is also in the Midwest, in the state of Illinois, in Chicago today, following Barack Obama.

Hi, Candy.

CROWLEY: Hi, Dana. Thanks.

That is indeed what is so exciting about this '08 race. We never quite know what's going to happen.

For all of you who love all politics most of the time, a programming note. Tonight, don't miss "LARRY KING LIVE," 9:00 Eastern Time. His guest, Senator John McCain. Now, "Ballot Bowl" is going to be right back with lots more, including a talk with our Jessica Yellin, who is in Columbus, Ohio, with Hillary Clinton.

We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CROWLEY: Hi and welcome back to CNN's "Ballot Bowl '08," the Thursday edition.

We continue to monitor Mike Huckabee. He is right across the border from here.

I'm Candy Crowley, live in Chicago, Illinois.

And that's Mike Huckabee, who, as you well know, is the former Republican governor of Arkansas. He is campaigning right now in Madison, Wisconsin. We'll continue to watch that.

Right now we want to talk a little bit about what's ahead. As you know, there is a Wisconsin primary coming up this Tuesday, but let's fast forward and take a look at where Hillary Clinton is trying to stake her claim, back into front-runner status.

You can see here that on that day the primaries will include both Ohio and Texas. This is where we expect to see Hillary Clinton over the next several weeks.

These are delegate-rich states. These are also states that have a lot of those voters that have come to be known as Hillary Clinton's base constituency -- working class voters, lower-income voters, particularly in Ohio. It is here that her campaign believes she will do very well, and it is here that many believe Hillary Clinton's campaign will either be made or broken.

We want to take you now to Columbus, Ohio, where Hillary Clinton will be campaigning later in the day, and our Jessica Yellin.

Jessica, it's been talked of as fertile ground there for Hillary Clinton. How do they size it up there in the campaign?

JESSICA YELLIN, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, the Clinton folks think that this is a state, first of all, as you say, that she must win. They acknowledge that she must win here, and not just by a small margin. She has to get a hefty margin to pick up enough delegates to close the gap with Barack Obama, since he has now pulled ahead.

And they feel that she's strong here, both because she has this message that resonates with working class voters, with people who have concerns about the economic conditions, about health care reform, about all these kinds of things that she is so expertise in and in which she's made her campaign stand around these issues. They also say, you know, she's well liked from the days back when her president -- when her husband was president. But the downside in all of that is that her husband also passed NAFTA, the free trade agreement that's been blamed for taking so many jobs not just away from America, but away from folks right here in Ohio.

And Barack Obama's campaign has been hitting Hillary Clinton on the NAFTA issue, saying that she essentially was a supporter of NAFTA, which is so unpopular among many of the key voters here. Today she's hit back, saying, you know, "I have the history of creating jobs...," she says, she said to an audience here, "... unlike my opponent, who basically has not had much history creating jobs."

And even John McCain has picked up on some of Hillary Clinton's themes, saying that Barack Obama's speeches are singularly lacking in specifics. So what we're going to hear a lot of from Hillary Clinton are those specifics she so good at, and also this line that we hear her using more and more these days, that she's not just offering promises, she's also offering solutions.

Let's listen to some of what she said in Ohio.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. HILLARY RODHAM CLINTON (D-NY), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Over the years you've heard plenty of promises, from plenty of people in plenty of speeches. And some of those speeches were probably pretty good. But speeches don't put food on the table, speeches don't fill up your tank, speeches don't fill your prescription or do anything about that stack of bills that keeps you up at night.

That's the difference between me and my Democratic opponent. My opponent makes speeches. I offer solutions.

(APPLAUSE)

It's one thing to get people excited. I want to empower you. This is not about me, this is about you, how I help you live up to your dreams so we can all go forward together.

There is a lot of talk in this campaign about what kind about what kind of change we'll bring. Well, you know, change is going to happen whether we want it or not. Change is part of life.

The question is, who will deliver progress to America? That's the kind of change we want. We want progress, not just any old change.

Now, my opponent says he'll take on the special interests. Well, he told people he stood up to the nuclear industry and passed a bill against them. But he actually let the nuclear industry water down his bill and the bill never actually passed.

On top of that, the same company that watered down that bill lobbied for Dick Cheney's energy bill. And my opponent voted for that energy bill with its billions of dollars of tax breaks for the oil industry. I voted against it. I think I was right, and that's what I will fight for.

(APPLAUSE)

My opponent says he'll stand up for workers. And he often talks about the plight of Maytag workers in his home state of Illinois. But the union at that plant supports me, because when 1,600 jobs were being lost, they say he didn't do a thing to help them.

My opponent says he will cut health care costs more aggressively than I do. But as an independent analysis shows, the most effective way to lower costs is to really cover everyone. His health care plan doesn't, but mine does.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

YELLIN: So, Candy, that's Senator Clinton making the case on the campaign trail that Barack Obama makes promises but she claims he doesn't always follow through with them.

And Senator Clinton will be here in Columbus around 6:00 this evening local -- Candy.

CROWLEY: Jessica, a couple of things.

First of all, this is a lot of territory to cover, Wisconsin, Ohio. Looking way ahead, Pennsylvania. And there are other primaries going on as well next Tuesday.

So, she's got a superdelegate in Bill Clinton and in Chelsea Clinton. Are they being deployed?

YELLIN: Absolutely. We've learned today that in fact Chelsea Clinton is being sent all the way over to Hawaii.

One of the items the Clinton campaign is now sharing with reporters, one of their new strategies, is to correct what they consider something of a mistake, which was not really deploying their people in smaller states and in caucus states, all these little states that we saw Barack Obama just sweep through with so much success over these last few days. The Clinton campaign really wasn't deployed in those states very significantly.

So they're saying they've learned from that and they are going to put their people out. So Wisconsin and Hawaii vote at the same time, and Chelsea is going to Hawaii. And the campaign says when she shows up, they actually do better.

She campaigned vigorously in California, and it was the one place they won the youth vote. So they're hoping they can at least pick up some delegates, even if they don't actually win Hawaii, since it is Obama's home state -- Candy.

CROWLEY: It seems to me it's about time we go cover Chelsea Clinton in the Hawaii primary.

YELLIN: I'm with you on that. I'll wrestling for it.

CROWLEY: OK. Thanks, Jessica, who, nonetheless, is in Columbus, Ohio, awaiting the Hillary Clinton campaign.

Mike Huckabee still talking in Madison, Wisconsin. We will be right back after this break.

"Ballot Bowl" continues.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BASH: Welcome back to "Ballot Bowl '08." I'm Dana Bash in Burlington, Vermont.

And you can probably see behind me there, now breaking down what was a rally here for John McCain. And John McCain is heading, as we speak, to the next stop he has today on the campaign trail, and that's Rhode Island.

Now, Vermont and Rhode Island are two states that are going to hold primaries in about two weeks, on March 4th. Actually two of four primaries that day. Next week is a Wisconsin primary.

John McCain is going to head there tomorrow, but right now, as we speak, his Republican rival, who is still in this race, Mike Huckabee, is addressing supporters and addressing voters, hoping to get their vote.

Let's listen.

(JOINED IN PROGRESS)

HUCKABEE: We've given them $9 trillion of debt and they have nothing to show for it. We've given them a world at war. We've given them the pain of a tax system that chokes the life out of those who want to start an enterprise and a business. And I want the Republican Party to once again be the champion of small business owners, where 50 percent of our jobs come from and 80 percent of our new jobs come from.

(APPLAUSE)

Today the toughest competition a lot of business people have is not from the guy across town. The toughest competition they have is from their own government, who makes it really tough for them to succeed because of the excessive taxation, regulation, and the threat of litigation.

It chokes the life out of their dreams and their hopes and their ideas. And we can do better than that, and we will do better than that.

And when we get energy independent, which is something we've got to do, wouldn't it be nice if instead of waiting to find out how the Saudis would like for us to run an economy and deal with our environment, if we could get to the place -- and I propose that we do it within 10 years -- that we have energy independence, and that we no longer depend upon somebody else for our fuel? But we instead depend upon domestically-produced, environmentally-friendly sources of energy that can provide this country's capacity, and we tell the Saudis, keep your oil and your sand, we don't need either one of them.

(APPLAUSE)

I want us to be on the offense with terrorism, but it's hard to really honestly do that when we're paying for both sides, when our military dollars are financed by our taxes. But on the other side, every time we buy oil we're paying for the very people who are out to kill us.

Now, there's no sense in that, folks. And from a standpoint of national security, it's time to say we're not going to pay for both sides of this war.

And by the way, we'll never have national security if we don't have border security. We're the only country on earth that doesn't actually totally and completely secure its borders. I promise we won't have amnesty, we will have a secure border.

(APPLAUSE)

It should not require you to have more paperwork to get on an airplane in Madison to go somewhere than it does for somebody to cross the international border. We can fix that, and we will.

And, folks, it occurs to me that we have a problem not only with people slipping across the border, but those we let in that we never keep up with once they get here. Did you know half of the illegals in the country are not people that slipped across the border? Half of them are people that came through with a legal visa, we stamped their card, welcomed them, gave them a big old smile and a handshake, and said come on in. But then their visas expired and we didn't do one thing to figure out what happened to them. Not one.

Every one of the 19 hijackers on September 11th came here legally. We welcomed them, we stamped their card, we said, come on in. And when their visas expired, we didn't do a thing, and they ended up with 63 different pieces of fake I.D. among the 19 of them before they finally ended up killing over 3,000 of our fellow citizens in the worst, most awful accident that most of us -- murder -- that most of us ever saw in our lives. And our government's response to that was, we don't know how to keep up with them. That's unacceptable.

A little girl was with her daddy at the post office one day. He went to buy some stamps and she was standing there looking at the 10 most wanted pictures on the wall of the post office. When he came back by from having bought the stamps to grab her hand and take her out, she said, "daddy, who are all these people?" And he said, "well, honey, those are the 10 most wanted of the FBI. These are the people that we're spending most of our efforts looking for, the most desperate criminals in the country. We're looking for these people trying to find them." And the little girl looked up at her dad in total innocence and said, "well, daddy, if we wanted them so badly, how come we didn't just keep them when we took their picture?"

DANA BASH, CNN ANCHOR: That's Mike Huckabee, the Republican presidential candidate, speaking in Madison, Wisconsin, about several issues. Of course, the issue of immigration, which he may think still puts him above John McCain in that John McCain really had been quite opposed to, or at least had disagreements with many people in his party on that issue historically.

Also talking about something that really -- one of the few things that Mike Huckabee says that is quite different in terms of the issues, from Democrats and Republicans, which is the fact that he calls for the United States to cut off ties with Saudi Arabia. Something that he says is necessary in order to change the way the United States deals with its oil problem. But it's a bit controversial as far as Democrats and Republicans have historically looked at that country.

Now as we continue to monitor Mike Huckabee speaking live in Madison, Wisconsin, we want to bring you up to date on just how big of a hill, pretty much an impossible hill at this point, Mike Huckabee has to climb in order to get the Republican nomination. The delegate count right now, John McCain 827 delegates. Mike Huckabee 217. We have Mitt Romney still in here at 286. He has not released his delegates. He wants to hold on to them until the Republican convention this summer. And Ron Paul very far behind at 16. There you see mathematically, though, for Mike Huckabee, it is virtually impossible to get up to the 1,191 needed in order to become the Republican nominee.

Now you saw Mike Huckabee speaking in Wisconsin. That's because there is a primary there this Tuesday on the Republican side. There's also one on the Democratic side. And when we come back after the break, we're going to bring you Barack Obama, who was speaking in Racine, Wisconsin, last night. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CANDY CROWLEY, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome back to BALLOT BOWL, the Thursday edition. I'm Candy Crowley, coming to you live from Chicago, Illinois. Home base for Barack Obama.

Want to show you a picture here. You are looking at Waukesha, Wisconsin. The city we love to say that name. That's Bill Clinton. We were just talking about surrogates going out to states that Hillary Clinton cannot get to. This is one of them. She'll be here later in the week. But for now, she has dispatched her husband, super surrogate, to be sure. We'll continue to monitor that.

Right now we want to take a look at next Tuesday and what's at stake. Again, really the big prize on Tuesday will be Wisconsin. You will also note that Washington state is lit up there in the dark blue. And that may sound familiar to you. Yes, they did hold caucuses not that long ago. Barack Obama on the Democratic side won those. This is a primary in Washington state. It is a beauty contest. No delegates are at stake in that.

We will also see on Tuesday, the Hawaiian caucuses. That, of course, is where Barack Obama grew up. They expect him to do very well there. But again, Chelsea Clinton, as Jessica Yellin told us just a while ago, is going to go there and speak for her mother. So all of those we will be watching for you in special coverage on Tuesday night.

So we want to talk again about Barack Obama, who yesterday was in Wisconsin. He worked his way largely through working class areas. That is, in the heart of where Hillary Clinton goes, where the base of her constituency is. The group that has been fueling her campaign. He, of course, is trying to cut into that. And in the process, he talked a lot about his economic plan to restore jobs and stability to the economy, particularly for the middle class and the working class. Here's a bit of it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. BARACK OBAMA, (D) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: What I think we have to do is to fundamentally change our tax code. We need to take the tax breaks away from companies that ship jobs overseas and put those tax breaks to work with companies that are putting people to work right here in Racine.

We need to roll back Bush tax cuts on the wealthy and give you a tax break if you're making less than $75,000. If you're making less than $75,000, I want to offset your payroll tax. $1,000 per family. If you're a senior citizen that makes $50,000 a year or less, I want to eliminate your income tax because you're already struggling with higher costs.

If you're a homeowner with a modest home and you don't itemize your income tax returns right now, I want to give you an extra mortgage deduction because it shouldn't just be a millionaire who's got a million dollar house that gets to deduct his mortgage interest. You should be able to do it, too. That's just basic fairness. That's the kind of fairness I want to restore to our income tax.

And understand, I pay for all of it. Any tax cut I give you, I pay for it by closing a tax break or a loophole or a tax haven. We're just restoring fairness. And it's good for the economy because, just like politics works when it's bottom-up, economic growth work when it's bottom-up. When ordinary workers have money to spend, they can look after their kids, they're able to afford a home, the entire economy prospers.

I want to change our trade agreements so that we've got labor and environmental standards so that U.S. workers are not being undermined. We've got the best workers in the world but they've got to have a level playing field if they're going to compete in this international economy.

I don't want to raise the minimum wage every 10 years. I want to raise it to keep pace with inflation. Because if you work in this country, you should not be poor.

I don't want to just talk about the 47 million people without health insurance, I want to do something about it. I said, I'm going to put forward a plan every single American in this country will be able to get health care that is as good as the health care I have as a member of Congress. You won't be able to be excluded for pre-existing conditions.

We will negotiate with the drug companies for the cheapest available price. If you already have health insurance, we're going to work with your employer and we're going to lower your premiums by up to $2,500 a year. And we are not going to wait 20 years from now to do this or 10 years from now to do this. We're going to do this by the end of my first term as president of the United States of America.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CROWLEY: Barack Obama going after those delegates for next Tuesday's primary in Wisconsin. Again, making a strong pitch to working class voters with his economic plan. He did very well, in fact, among working class voters in the Potomac Primary in Virginia, in Maryland, in Washington, D.C. He would like to see a repeat of that in Wisconsin on Tuesday.

We want to now go back to our Jessica Yellin, because, Jessica, I was just getting the delegate numbers at stake in some of these states that she's going back and forth in, Ohio, 141 delegates. That is a big prize. Big stakes for her there.

JESSICA YELLIN, CNN ANCHOR: Huge stakes, Candy. It could close the gap if she swept here. But the Clinton campaign knows it's an uphill fight with all this momentum Barack Obama has now and his campaign continually putting out news of new endorsements or super delegates going to his teams. The Clintons know they have to make their stand in both Ohio and in Texas. And they're not the only ones saying it. James Carville, for example, who is not a member of this Clinton campaign, but is an advisor to President Clinton and is very close to both of them, had this to say to Larry King last night.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JAMES CARVILLE, CNN POLITICAL CONTRIBUTOR: Certainly would be preferable for her to win Wisconsin, but I don't put it in the same category as I would put Texas and Ohio on March the 4th.

LARRY KING, "LARRY KING LIVE": James, if Hillary loses Texas or Ohio, is it over?

CARVILLE: Yes.

KING: Simply put, yes.

CARVILLE: I'll make it -- yes, she has to win Texas and Ohio.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

YELLIN: Can't get much more definitive than that.

Candy, the Clintons also understand, I think, that the Texas case is a lot easier for them to make. They've been organized in that state for over a year. It's a very large state. So it would be harder for Barack Obama to just barnstorm the state and turn it around. So they feel a little bit more confident, or they should, the Clintons, with Texas.

But Senator Clinton has a steeper fight, a more of a battle royale here in Ohio because the blue collar workers here that she should be able to woo with her message of economic revitalization and health care reform are some of the people that Barack Obama has also started to appeal to of late. And there's also a good number of people who would have been Edwards supporters here, unions, union people. And the question is, if John Edwards decides to endorse any time before this Ohio primary, that really could make the difference for either of these two candidates. So that could be crucial. Both of them would love that endorsement, no doubt.

Candy.

CROWLEY: You know, Jessica, we saw from James Carville a pretty stark analysis of what's at stake in these two huge states. And I know that the Obama campaign has said, looked, you know, we look ahead, we see the math, there is no way she can catch up in delegates. Give me the viewpoint from the Clinton campaign side. What is their game plan? How do they see this coming out?

YELLIN: They see her winning with enough of a margin on March 4th in both Texas and Ohio that they'll be within 25 delegates of Barack Obama. So with a 25 delegates split, they would like to enter the next smaller states after that and pick up as many delegates as they can and potentially go into the convention tied. So that it would really come down to these super delegates, all those elected officials and muckedty-mucks who don't have to listen to anyone else, they can make their own decision about who to support.

We've heard the Clinton campaign say all along that these super delegates were put in place because they're supposed to use their judgment and not just do -- follow what their states have done. The Obama campaign says, no, they should just reflect the will of the voters and the super delegates should go with whoever has the larger vote, the larger delegate count, heading into the convention.

So the Clinton camp really is looking to make this a super delegate fight at the convention, but that all depends on her winning by a strong enough margin in Ohio and Texas to still be in the running at that point.

Candy.

CROWLEY: Jessica Yellin, thanks so much, in Columbus, Ohio, awaiting the Clinton campaign to arrive.

We want to give you a programming note. We've just told you how very important Texas is going to be in this race for the Democratic nomination. So you will not want to miss next Thursday, 8:00 Eastern Time, in Austin, Texas. The Democratic debate. Hillary Clinton one- on-one with Barack Obama, 8:00 Eastern Time, a week from today in Austin, Texas. Don't miss it.

Now, Bill Clinton still in Waukesha, Wisconsin. We're going to give you a bit of him when BALLOT BOWL continues right after this break.

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CROWLEY: Welcome back. This is CNN's Thursday edition of BALLOT BOWL. Your chance to hear these candidates, sometimes live, sometimes taped, but always unfiltered, pretty much as we see them as we go across the country with these various campaigns.

There are also, of course, out there the surrogates. And there is probably no better surrogate, at least when he's on his game, as Bill Clinton, highly popular in the Democratic Party. His wife has dispatched him to a number of places. Obviously he got into a little bit of trouble early on trying to defend his wife, but there's been an adjustment in how Bill Clinton now goes about his surrogate duties, and that is, he is not so much defending her as promoting her. So right now live from Waukesha, Wisconsin, it's Hillary Clinton's top surrogate.

BILL CLINTON, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT: That's her whole point, that America's got to get back in the solutions business. And that if we do, we're going to do fine.

Now, why should she be the person to lead that? Number one, because all her life that's the business she's been in. Let me just tell you some things that aren't widely known.

When we met in law school, it was relatively rare for a woman to be a law student back in the dark ages. Now over half of the law students are. But one thing that hasn't changed is, most people after the first year cannot wait to get out of law school. They've been going to school a long time. Half of them or more have student debt. They just want to get off, get out, pay off their debts and get on with their lives.

She broke the mold. She took a fourth year, an extra year, to work at the hospital associated with our university on the problems of severely abused and neglected children, because, believe it or not, more than three decades ago, nearly no states had protections for these kids. She would come home night after night after night and say, Bill, I keep seeing these kids in the hospital with cigarette burns on their arm that haven't been fed in a week. Severely emaciated. And the laws didn't protect them because people were so reluctant to interfere in family disciplinary decisions.

So she took another year and worked with other people. They came up with all these recommended standards. Now they've been adopted in virtually every state in the country. There's no state now where you can get away with abusing a kid like that. She was making changes in other people's lives as a student.

And then when we got out of law school, most people would have taken the lower of big prestigious jobs with good incomes, especially if you had to work your way through school and had debt, as she did. Not her. She took a low-paying job with the Children's Defense Fund. And her first big job as a lawyer was knocking on the doors of poor people's houses in New Bedford, Massachusetts. One of the reasons she won Massachusetts, I might add. Big. When all the political establishment was against her. Because they knew her.

So she's knocking on the doors of poor people's houses, asking why their children are dropping out of school. And what she and her young colleagues found was that most of these kids were dropping out of school because they had mental or physical disabilities. Usually quite minor ones. But the schools were totally disorganized then to deal with that. We had kids that may have a minor case of dyslexia and there were no teachers trained for them.

So the work these kids did, that the Children's Defense Fund sent to Congress, was the basis of the landmark Individuals with Disabilities Education Act which requires now in America an equal and appropriate public education for all of our kids without regard to disability. That was a huge change that she was making even as a young woman.

So then when she came to Arkansas and married me and I became governor, she wound up, for example, when she first came, organizing the first legal aid clinics for poor people that our part of the state had ever had. President Carter appointed her to the Legal Services Corporation Board. By the time she was 30, she was chairman of the board, just because she was making changes for other people. She had never run for anything.

She headed our education reform efforts. This should be relevant to you in the presidential race, because when she started, an expert said that we had the worse schools in the country, and when she finished the same guy said that we had improved our schools more than any state in the country except one other. That's what you want in a president, someone who can make positive changes in other people's lives.

She started a preschool program that she founded in . . .

CROWLEY: Bill Clinton in Waukesha, Wisconsin, campaigning for his wife there. There is, of course, a primary in Wisconsin now. Barack Obama is concentrating all of his time in Wisconsin, trying to pick up the majority of those delegates there. And, of course, his ninth straight win.

Obama was there yesterday with some specifics about his economic plan as he courted the working class vote, very important in Wisconsin, particularly in the suburban areas. He talks a great deal about Hillary Clinton, as well as, by the way, John McCain, the man that he believes will win the Republican nomination. Obama basically says everybody in the Democratic Party is about change, but I am the person that can best affect it because I will work with Democrats, I will work with independents, I will work with Republicans, that he is the one that can best affect change because he is not bound by all the old Washington baggage, all the old ways of Washington, of course, referring to Hillary Clinton.

He has, in fact, if you put these two candidates side-by-side, you will find that largely they are in agreement about most things. There are some differences around the edges. Most Democrats will tell you that they'd be happy with either one of them. Obama's argument, of course, is that he is something new and that he can best affect change because he doesn't have the kind of past that has been so partisan and bitter that has failed to get a lot done.

So BALLOT BOWL's going to continue with a final word right after this break.

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CROWLEY: I'm Candy Crowley live from Chicago. That is pretty much it here on CNN's BALLOT BOWL. But we will be back tomorrow for the Friday edition.

Dana.

BASH: That's right, Candy.

And we want to thank you and, of course, our colleague, Jessica Yellin, who is in Columbus, Ohio. And, you know, today, we were really able to do what we try to do most here in BALLOT BOWL and bring a lot of candidates live from the campaign trail. We're going to have a lot more of BALLOT BOWL tomorrow at noon. Stay tuned for "Newsroom" which starts right after a break.

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