By DAVE BLOWER JR.
Farm World Editor

ANDERSON, Ind. — For the first time in 40 years, presidential candidates are courting Hoosier primary voters for their support.
Both leading Democratic Party candidates, Illinois Sen. Barack Obama and New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton have made campaign stops in Indiana in recent weeks. Obama hosted a town hall meeting at Plainfield High School, and Clinton followed with a raucous tour of Indiana with stops in Terre Haute, Anderson and Evansville. Indiana Sen. Evan Bayh, who has been rumored as a possible candidate for vice president candidate on a ticket led by Clinton, accompanied the former first lady across the Hoosier State.
Indiana has 72 Democratic Convention delegates up for grabs during its May 6 primary. Bayh was pleased that Indiana Democrats have an opportunity to help select the party’s president candidate, and he encouraged a crowd of more than 6,000 at the Wigwam basketball arena in Anderson to vote for Clinton.
“You know, it’s been 40 years since Indiana has had a presidential primary that mattered, and I say it’s about time,” Bayh shouted.
“We work hard for a living, to provide for ourselves and our loved ones. But it’s getting harder these days.
“Too many businesses are struggling; too many jobs have gone over to China. Healthcare costs, gasoline costs are too high for middle-American families, and we need to begin to do something about that - and, Hillary Clinton will.”
Clinton said little about agriculture and farm policy in the small central Indiana city that was once known as a hub of manufacturing jobs. She did say that she wanted to see more “Indiana-grown corn powering more Indiana-built cars.”
Clinton exclaimed, “It is going to be up to the next president to stand up and say loudly and clearly, ‘No more; we’re going to turn this around; we’re not going to be dependent on anybody else.’”
She said any free-trade policies that encourage businesses to move jobs away from America are going to be changed during her administration.
“We need to reverse this tide, this ocean of red ink that we have been submerged under because of George W. Bush’s failures and reckless policies. Then we are going to go through the tax code of the United States, and we’re going to remove every single advantage that goes to any business that exports a job out of Indiana to a foreign country.”
Although her husband, former President Bill Clinton, supported and signed the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) in the mid-1990s, Sen. Clinton said the policy should be reopened for review.
“I am the only candidate running who has said we will renegotiate NAFTA,” Clinton said. “It is not working the way it should for people in Anderson, Ind. and across America.
“I know that no one can do it alone.
“There isn’t anything a president can make happen by waving a magic wand, but there isn’t anything America can’t do once we make up our minds to actually get it done.”