It isn't over, former president said

On a campaign swing that included four western Oregon cities on Monday, former President Bill Clinton told a crowd of about 600 not to count his wife, Sen. Hillary Clinton, out in Oregon's Democratic primary.

Standing in the back of a pickup on the play yard of Lincoln School in south Corvallis, Clinton reminded the crowd of the times his wife, the junior senator from New York, had emerged victorious after being written off in previous months.

"I always get tickled when they keep saying the end is near," Clinton said. "She's been declared dead more times than a cat's got lives."

The Corvallis speech came midway through a two-and-a-half-day push for votes in an increasingly tight Democratic primary race. And while he repeated reasons why his wife deserved their vote, Bill Clinton assured Democrats that the party would close ranks around the nominee.

"However this comes out, you can rest assured our family, our people - we're going to win the White House back," Clinton said.

The former president spent Sunday in Pendleton, Baker City, Redmond and Portland. On Monday, he was in Astoria and Tillamook before arriving in Corvallis and then traveling to Eugene. He will be in Portland tonight.

Carol Moore of Corvallis wouldn't say who has her vote, but she commented that Oregon's primary has never carried so much importance in her lifetime.

"These are interesting times and are getting more interesting all the time," she said.

The campaign sent school officials scrambling over the weekend to plan the event, which was originally set up in the gymnasium. Crowds quickly passed the 320-person capacity, however, and the event was moved outside.

Clinton's campaign stop was billed as a "bring your ballot" event, designed to get out Oregon's mail-in vote on behalf of the New York senator. Clinton commented on the campaign pressures caused by Oregon's vote-by-mail system, which allows people most of May to cast a ballot.

"You're always doing something different," he said. "We're all trying to keep up with the fact you've got a user-friendly system, and good for you."

Courtney Lange brought her ballot to the event, filled out for Hillary Clinton. She said she chose Clinton primarily because of plans to ease student loan repayment programs.

"That's something that'll affect me because I'm in school now," Lange said. "She seems really competent, and Bill was in office, too, so that helps."

Ballots are rolling in to the Benton County election office, and returns are growing heavier each day in advance of next Tuesday's deadline, according to Jill Van Buren, Benton County's elections supervisor.

As of Friday, she said, 5,427 ballots had been collected out of 46,999 registered voters. Early Democrat primary voters more than doubled the number of Republicans who have already voted. At the end of the week, 3,347 Democrats had voted - 15 percent of registered party members - compared to

10.8 percent, or 1,445 Republicans. Primary voters have until 8 p.m. May 20 to return primary ballots.

Christian Gross of Corvallis said Clinton made a great case for Hillary Clinton, but he was still leaning toward challenger, Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois.

"She'd make a good president," Gross said. "This country is so divided, and I think Obama has the best chance of uniting the country."

Gross said that despite his vote for Obama, he admired Bill Clinton's persuasiveness.

"He's a Rhodes Scholar; he's the best speaker around," Gross said. "You can't present the case any better."

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