Rendell bus tour kicks off in Phila.

Democratic Party chief Ed Rendell and U.S. Senate candidate Ron Klink hit Philly yesterday to show their support for the Gore-Lieberman campaign -- and to do some campaigning of their own. Rendell, the popular former mayor of Philadelphia, and Klink, a U.S. congressman trying to unseat Republican Sen. Rick Santorum, were on a last-minute get-out-the-vote mission called the Seven Days -- Seven Reasons Express Tour. Joined by U.S. Rep. John Dingell (D-Mich.) and Texas State Rep. Garnet Coleman, they began the tour at the University of Pennsylvania Health System's Grays Ferry Medical Practice. Rendell will be stopping in cities throughout Pennsylvania from now until next Tuesday, joined by a host of political celebrities such as Health and Human Services Secretary Donna Shalala and several elected officials, to discuss pertinent election issues and to help drum up essential support for Gore and Klink, who is running well behind Santorum in both fundraising and polls. And the visit will also help Rendell, a Penn alum, gain name recognition as he gears up for a gubernatorial run in 2002. "We are aware that Pennsylvania is up for grabs," Rendell said, noting that it is one of the crucial battleground states in this year's presidential election, with both candidates actively fighting for its 23 electoral votes. A poll released yesterday by Millersville University showed the race in the state to be a statistical dead heat, with Texas Gov. George W. Bush at 43 percent and Vice President Gore with 42 percent. Nine percent remain undecided. On the docket yesterday was the Patient's Bill of Rights, which Dingell co-authored and fought to pass. The bill seeks to protect doctors and patients under the HMO system, in particular by giving them the right to sue an HMO -- a right which currently does not exist. "The Patient's Bill of Rights is a bipartisan issue," Dingell said to the crowd of about 30 self-proclaimed Gore/Klink supporters. "Politics should be about serving the public and telling the truth." Dingell also pointed out that the Patient's Bill of Rights lost in the Senate by only one vote -- and that one of those voting against it was the conservative Santorum, who has sought during his campaign to move away from the firebrand conservative image that propelled him to office in the Republican landslide of 1994. Klink agreed Americans should have a way to blow the whistle on the HMOs. "We have it in the nuclear industry, we need it in the medical industry," he pointed out. Klink supports an individual's right to sue an HMO because without that right, he says, "It is a patient's bill of suggestions." "If Ron Klink was in [the] U.S. Senate and Rick Santorum was back home, Al Gore would have cast the deciding vote, President Clinton would have signed [the bill]," Klink said. Coleman, a Texas legislator who has served with Bush, claimed that Bush would not support the Patient's Bill of Rights because "his friends, the insurance companies" would not want him to pass that kind of legislation. Rendell, who spent much of his speech promoting Gore, also took a moment to address the role of Green Party nominee Ralph Nader. "Ralph Nader won't become the next president," Rendell said. "And the premise of his campaign [that there is no difference between Bush and Gore] is silly." Rendell said Nader voters need to realize that there's a difference between the Republican and Democratic candidates. "If you're an environmentalist ... or if you're a woman who believes in the right to choose," then there's a big difference between Bush and Gore, Rendell said.