Oct 10, 2008  |  By: CHRIS JOHNSON  | COMMENTS     

Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.) led a chorus of voices that called for change Saturday at the Human Rights Campaign National Dinner in Washington.

Clinton spoke to the event’s approximately 3,000 attendees via satellite from Los Angeles, encouraging them to do “everything they can” to elect Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama and make the election “a great Democratic victory.”

“We are faced with a choice,” she said. “We can take steps toward a better future, towards securing equality and dignity for all Americans —regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity — or we can choose four more years of the same failed policy, four more years of the same small-minded governance, four more years that will be just like the last eight.”

HRC President Joe Solmonese and dinner honorees Suze Orman, a personal finance expert, and Bruce Bastian, a philanthropist and HRC board member, also urged attendees to support gay rights during the November election.

During her televised appearance, Clinton read the prepared remarks of Sen. Joe Biden (D-Del.), Obama’s running mate, who cancelled his weekend appearances to visit his ailing mother-in-law. Bonny Jean Jacobs, Jill Biden’s mother, died Sunday.

Clinton said Obama has stood for gay rights many times in the past, citing his vote against the Federal Marriage Amendment in the Senate, his call for an end to “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” and support for a full repeal of the Defense of Marriage Act.

Clinton said hate crimes legislation would become law under an Obama administration. She made no other explicit promises as to which bills might become law if the Democratic presidential candidate were elected to the White House.

Clinton said that during the 2000 election, the Republican Party’s presidential nominee, Texas Gov. George Bush, pledged “to build a compassionate society,” met with a group of gay Republicans called the “Austin 12,” and promised moderation in social policies.

“We saw how that story ends,” she said. “Nine straight months of job losses, nearly 46 million Americans without health insurance, foreclosures skyrocketing and home values tumbling … and a culture in Washington where the very few wealthy and powerful have a seat at the table and everybody else is on the menu.”

Clinton compared Bush’s promises of reform in 2000 to Republican presidential nominee John McCain’s statements in this election. She said McCain’s promises would lead to “just more of the same” policies from the Bush administration.

“[John McCain is] not a maverick — he’s a mimic,” Clinton said.