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Lincoln supports Clinton, opposes nomination going to convention Friday, May 30, 2008 By Jeremy Peppas Arkansas News Bureau LITTLE ROCK - Sen. Blanche Lincoln's talk went from military benefits for guardsmen and reserves to presidential politics Thursday following a news conference. "I support Sen. (Hillary) Clinton in what she is doing" Lincoln said. "I'm behind her on that and I think Sen. Clinton has every right to stay in this primary. Primaries are designed to go through June and that's important." Lincoln is one 12 Democratic Party superdelegates from Arkansas, and of that group, 11 are supporting Clinton in her run for the presidential nomination against Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill. The other, Lottie Shackelford, has told The Associated Press she won't make a decision until the convention in August. Lincoln stopped in Little Rock Thursday morning as part of a tour of the state to push her proposed plan to increase benefits for members of the Arkansas National Guard and Reserve. Her comments about Clinton came during a question-and-answer session with reporters after her prepared remarks. "As a supporter of Sen. Clinton, I will continue to support her through this primary process," Lincoln said. "I will get behind whoever the Democratic nominee is and I will encourage my party to unify itself sooner rather than later." She's also hopeful that process will be done soon. "I don't think we need to take it all the way to the convention," Lincoln said. "I hope that the meeting on Saturday will be productive and as Democrats I hope that we will resolve this issue by mid-to late-June." The meeting she referred to will be the Democratic National Committee's Rules and Bylaws Committee at a hotel in Washington. Lincoln announced her support of Clinton on Feb. 6, a day after the Arkansas presidential primary, in which Clinton, former first lady of the state and nation, polled 70 percent of the vote to 26 percent for Obama. Although a superdelegate, Lincoln says the Democratic Party, needs to develop a system that would not allow relatively few people to choose a nominee. "I don't think that it should be up to the superdelegates," Lincoln said. "The Democratic Party needs to get together and figure out how to move forward in a unified way and that's going to mean including Sen. Clinton and Sen. Obama and their camps as well as superdelegates and the national party. "I hope that the Democrats will do that because four more years of more of the same is not going to be productive for the country. I think that's one of the reasons why the Democrats have to come together and rally," she said. "I don't know how they'll do that yet, but that's what Saturday's meeting will be about." |
