Q5 with Biden

Democratic vice presidential candidate Sen. Joe Biden took a few minutes during his swing through the Kansas City area Thursday for an interview with The Examiner. Biden held campaign stops in St. Joseph and Liberty Thursday before heading to scheduled stops in Jefferson City and Springfield today.

1 Both campaigns are spending a lot of time in Missouri recently. How important is winning Missouri to winning the election?
It’s critically important. If we win Missouri, this is over. We win. We can still win if we don’t win Missouri. We’re in the hunt, but we have a long way to go. We feel good about it. I’m asked in other interviews around the state ‘what about Missouri.’ What I find is that wherever I’m at, there’s no difference in being in Wilmington, Del., or Santa Fe, N.M... Everybody is focused on the same thing: this economy.

2 The Republicans carried Missouri in recent presidential elections. What does the Obama-Biden campaign have to do to turn it back into a blue state?
What we’re seeing now in terms of the economy, the loss of jobs in your state, the 150,000 people with no health insurance, the highest unemployment rate in 17 years. This is a product of not John McCain alone but a product of a failed economic philosophy. Look, he’s (McCain) lurching back and forth. He’s trying like the devil to demonstrate he’s ahead of the curve, so his campaign goes to Washington, and the talks break down (on the economic bail out). It’s not looking like a steady hand.

3 Independence, as you know, is the home of Harry Truman, regarded as one the country’s great presidents. Does Barack Obama have anything in common with Harry Truman?
Well, I know I have a lot in common with Harry Truman. The thing that Barack Obama has in common with Harry Truman is that you tell them the truth. You remember that famous expression, and everybody in Independence knows it. ‘Give ‘em hell, Harry, and I’m going to tell them the truth and they’re going to think it’s hell.’ The way we win Missouri is we tell them the truth. And I’m going to tell you something: It is hell for a whole lot of people in your state.

4 What’s the one concern you hear the most when talking to voters during your campaign stops through Missouri?
Right behind their job is their house and their health care. It depends on where they are economically. In other words, people who don’t have to sell their house, who are middle age and who had a mortgage, they want to talk to me about ‘when’s this going to end and what about my health care? How can I keep my kid in college?’ There’s a lot of people in your state going to bed at night staring at the ceiling and literally thinking ‘holy, God... I’m out of work, what the hell’s going to happen to the house?’ There’s more anxiety than I’ve ever seen.

5 There’s a light rail proposal for Kansas City on the November ballot. How is the campaign planning to help cities like KC create a mass transit system?
We’re going to do two things. It’s right out of the Harry Truman playbook, all kidding aside. We propose spending $60 billion over the next 10 years on infrastructure. We’re going to be investing in everything from light rail to highways to bridges and everything else. Mass transit is an integral part of our energy program.