Dodd's bus tour rolls through Iowa

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By Josh Nelson | Friday, July 6, 2007 12:35 AM CDT | () comments

WATERLOO, Iowa — If this week’s flurry of campaign visits is any indicator, the Iowa caucuses are anything but decided. That’s good news for U.S. Sen. Chris Dodd, D-Conn.

Dodd made a stop Thursday in Waterloo during a five-day bus tour through the state to drum up support for his presidential bid.

The Connecticut Democrat said he believes Iowans are still looking for someone who can provide “bold, clear leadership.”

“It’s now our watch, our opportunity to make sure this turns out right,” Dodd said to a crowd of about 60 Democratic activists. “So, electing people who not only stand on the issues and sense of it, but also talk about the future and what we can do for our nation and the kind of leadership we’ll provide for the country. It will be terribly, terribly important.”

Among those issues is a solution to getting troops out of Iraq, international trade and immigration reform.

Dodd said the conflict in Iraq has devolved into a civil war and beyond what the U.S. military can control. Instead, he said he wanted to see the government engage in a diplomatic solution while troops are being redeployed over the course of eight or nine months.

Dodd also said that redeployment should begin immediately.

“I’m not going to wait until 2009,” he said. “I’m going to do everything I can in the coming weeks to cut off funding and stop this program that we’ve got going now and change our direction.”

On immigration, Dodd said there needed to be increased penalties for businesses that knowingly hire illegal immigrants and eliminating a guest worker program, which he said would act as “a magnet” for more illegal immigration.

Those two items “would probably do more than any fence you build along the border in terms of stopping the flow of people coming in,” he said.

The five-term US senator

hasn’t peaked above 2 percent in recent polls in the state and drastically trails front-runner candidates in fundraising.

Dodd said Iowans take seriously their role in helping determine the next Democratic nominee, and potentially who will be the next president. As such, they don’t always bow to the horse-race mentality of campaigns.

“You don’t like to be told 190 days ahead of time who the winner is going to be either,” Dodd said. “You love to prove the pundits wrong. You love to show them you are going to make up your own minds.“

Singer Paul Simon is flying into Mason City today to join Dodd for the last two days of his bus tour, which began in southwest Iowa.

Contact Josh Nelson at (319) 291-1565 or josh.nelson@wcfcourier.com.