Twenty Years Ago this week in The Colorado Statesman … President Bill Clinton made a campaign stop in Denver and was greeted at his visit to the Little Sisters of the Poor healthcare facility by Gov. Roy Romer, Archbishop J. Francis Stafford and hundreds of supporters anxious to hear the president’s speech about Medicaid and the upcoming budget fight with the Republican-controlled Congress. During the reception, Clinton asked those present to sing “Happy Birthday” to 94-year-old Ethel Hoag. Then it was off to Pueblo to gab about education and cuts to college financial aid proposed by congressional Republicans. And then back again to Denver for a latté at the downtown Tattered Cover bookstore before joining Vice President Al Gore at a $1,000-a-plate fundraiser at a downtown hotel, which raised a reported $550,000, campaign officials said.

Mother Nature threw a wrench in the schedule, however, grounding Air Force One at Buckley Air National Guard Base while the plane was de-iced with equipment borrowed from Denver International Airport, giving the president the chance to shake hands and schmooze at what turned into an unscheduled campaign event. “I went out there to send off the vice president and ended up having a long conversation with the president on Medicare and block grants,” said a grinning state Rep. Bob Hagedorn, D-Aurora, who joined some 30 lawmakers and activists “and about 40 Secret Service agents,” he cracked, at the air field under the nasty weather. “This is the closest I have ever been to a presidential visit,” said state Rep. Gil Romero, D-Pueblo, after helping organize the visit to his hometown. He crowed about the inclusion of Republican state Sen. Gigi Dennis and state Rep. Joyce Lawrence in the presidential receiving line. “I remember when President Bush visited Colorado and Democrats weren’t allowed to participate,” Romero said. “I teased Gigi, cutting in front of her in line and saying that Republicans had to go to the back.” State Sen. Ken Gordon, D-Denver, praised the visit’s “nice subtle mood” after attending the Little Sisters of the Poor event. “It was nice to have the president there to speak on health care, but I am concerned that the issue is so partisan and politicized.” State GOP spokeswoman Cinamon Watson, however, said that Clinton was blowing smoke about supposed threats to financial aid and Medicaid cuts. …

Thirty Years Ago this week in The Colorado Statesman … Colorado Democrats pulled no punches at a Glenwood Springs hearing of the Directions 2000 Commission, a group formed to chart the party’s course into the millennium. Past U.S. Senate candidate Herrick Roth encouraged the party to pay less attention to the so-called “glamour” candidates — Gov. Dick Lamm, U.S. Sen. Gary Hart and U.S. Reps. Tim Wirth and Pat Schroeder — and instead concentrate on “the nuts and bolts” of party organization. “They’re not part of the party,” Roth charged, “because they’re draining the money.” Lamm, for his part, offered a multitude of suggestions through legal aide Mark Grueskin: “We shouldn’t become a duplicate of the Republican Party, but we should take a page from their strategy,” he said, noting that the GOP figures out party policy first and then rallies supporters, instead of the other way around, like the Democrats have done. “We appealed to specific groups with specific promises. It backfired,” he counseled. Comparing the Democrats to the “sinking Titanic,” Grueskin said the party was “apt to end up on the bottom of the ocean itself if new ideas aren’t dredged up.” Summit County Dem chair Joe Sands also unloaded a round of suggestions, including listening to local activists instead of expecting them to listen to party bosses. “I challenge you to keep issues and platforms mainstream,” he concluded. “I challenge you to question the ‘marketing experts’ who say, ‘forget the Grands and Garfields and target only certain areas.’ I challenge you to produce cheap home videos that we can show to locals and convince them that we can help with information, facts, finance and their future in politics. I challenge you to read Megatrends again, to read America’s Hidden Success and realize that our programs haven’t failed as much as our image of them has.” …

… At a fundraising dinner for Western Slope candidates held in Glenwood Springs, Wirth, the keynote speaker, quoted U.S. Sen. Barry Goldwater: “‘What this country needs is a choice, not an echo,’” Wirth said, adding, “What this country needs is a Democratic Party, not another Republican Party.” The GOP, the Democrat charged, “is living on both borrowed time and borrowed money,” pointing to the $200 billion deficit, the largest in the nation’s history. Wirth blamed President Ronald Reagan for doubling the deficit during his term. “It’s time for all of us to say that we’re not going to follow that kind of economics, that we’re going to follow a very different kind of approach to this country. What we’re doing is fundamental bankruptcy.” Wirth concluded with a story about an elderly man he’d recently seen with a sign that read, “America ain’t perfect, but we’re not done yet.”

— ernest@coloradostatesman.com