Clinton applauds activists in Bettendorf, vows Alzheimer’s funding

BETTENDORF - It was all about the up-close and personal at Hillary Clinton's stop Tuesday night in Bettendorf.

The former secretary of state shelved the usual stump speech and question-and-answer session. Her remarks lasted only about five minutes. But afterward, she stood on a stage, greeting volunteers and activists, one by one, as they snapped pictures, made small talk and readied themselves for the last five weeks before the Feb. 1 caucuses.

'Starting after the first of the year, we're going to have to really work hard,” the Democratic front-runner told a roomful of people at the United Steelworkers Local 105 union hall in Bettendorf.

Clinton's stop in the Quad Cities was her third of the day in Eastern Iowa, and she was 90 minutes late.

Still, people who came to see her milled about, talked among themselves and waited for their chance to chat with Clinton. She stayed after many of them had left, talking individually with people before exiting herself 45 minutes after she arrived to chants of 'I'm with her.”

Emily Slagle, a precinct captain from Blue Grass, talked with Clinton and posed for pictures with her, her husband, Zach, and their 5 1/2-month-old son, Henry.

'It'll be awesome to tell him when he's four or five and she's up for a second term that he got to meet her,” Slagle said afterward.

At a stop in Keota earlier in the day, Clinton lambasted GOP presidential front-runner Donald Trump as a bully.

'We shouldn't let anybody bully his way into the presidency because that is not who we are as Americans,” Clinton said.

On Monday Trump told a rally in Michigan that 'she was favored to win, and she got --------- by President Barack Obama in the 2008 election,” using Yiddish slang for male genitalia.

While campaigning Tuesday in Fairfield, Clinton called for major increases to money available for research into Alzheimer's disease and dementia, saying scientists believe they can make major strides if they have the funding to do so.

Clinton wants her administration to invest $2 billion per year in research. She believes that level of funding would 'make a cure possible by 2025.” While the strides necessary to cure various forms of dementia are not guaranteed, Clinton said the scientists she has spoken with believe breakthroughs are possible in that time frame.

The level of funding called for in her speech in Fairfield is far less than the hundreds of billions Clinton said the diseases cost in care, treatment and lost productivity.

'I believe we should take a fraction of that and put it toward research,” she said, adding that money and minds drive research when combined with specific goals. 'We have to set some goals if we're going to fight the disease.”

Right now there are more questions than answers.

'Two out of three Alzheimer's patients are women. Why? We need to find out,” said Clinton. 'Latinos and African-Americans are more likely to develop Alzheimer's than white people. Why? We need to find out.”

Bloomberg News and the Ottumwa Courier contributed to this report.