From Just Curious To State Delegate

LOUISE PITTARD, a sweet-mannered grandmother from Georgetown, Del., has backed Clinton "from the beginning. It just made me mad, when I began reading all those terrible things they were saying about him in the tabloids. I don't believe those stories. I think they were planted by the Republicans, because the White House knew from way back that Clinton was a real threat to them."

We need Clinton, she says, "because we need someone who is strong, energetic, will be balanced on foreign affairs, and who will be a conciliator between the races."

Mrs. Pittard, who is wearing a union button, retired two years ago from a teaching position with a state library.

She decided to go to a local caucus out of curiosity and was stunned when she was elected a delegate. Her husband, George, was annoyed at first because of the time it consumed. Now George is "very proud of her." She says that Democrats will carry the White House because they leave unified and - given what she saw at the time as the Bush/Perot splintering of the Republicans and the suburbs - have an open road to victory in November.