Richardson Speech

Before a near-capacity crowd in Kimmel Theater, Gov. Bill Richardson spoke on a multitude of issues, ranging from Iraq, to national debt, to farm subsidies, to job, to education, and even to sex education.

The governor turned a scheduled 15-minute speech into nearly an hour by answering more questions than the rest of the political visitors combined. At one point he simply collected questions from the audience en masse to be answered all at once, even dismissing his staff's time objections to spend more time with his audience.

Additionally, local print and television media were in attendance, and Richardson stayed after even longer to meet and greet both the crowd and the media.