For U. employee Robin Perley, the chance to see a former president was worth the $50 ticket. Also valuable, she said, was the opportunity "to be in a room with 1,500 Democrats" in the GOP-dominated state.

Asked what he thought of Utah after the reception he received, Clinton told the Deseret Morning News, "I love it here." Even though he's not very popular in the state, having come in third in his 1992 presidential race? "I still like it," he said.

"Apparently, some of my decisions may be more popular now than they were when I made them, including 'red rocks,"' a reference to his controversial designation in 1996 of the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument in southern Utah.

"I don't think anybody wants to give it up now. At least I've never heard anybody in Utah say they did," the two-term president said. At the time, the decision angered many Utahns, especially those who wanted to develop the area's coal.

"To be consistent, I have to say it must be possible for me to like people who don't like me. That's one of the big things we've got to do in the world to bring things back together," he said.

Hillary Clinton has plenty to offer Utahns, he said, and could even win the predominantly GOP state. "I think so," Bill Clinton told the newspaper, suggesting the state may benefit from her focus on finding ways to slow global warming that also boost the economy.

"If we all got this country unified around an independent, clean, efficient energy future, there would be something that every person from the most conservative to the most liberal to the most ardent Republican, the most ardent Democrat, something for everybody.

"This energy thing, because it touches every aspect of our lives, offers us enormous promise to reorganize America and to give us something that will bring us together by doing. It's a stunning opportunity, I think."

Stunning, he said, "especially for the West. Everybody wants to live here. ... If there's a water shortage, what's the Democrat and Republican answer to that. We've got to figure out a way to live together."

Looking for ways, for example, to make the bright lights of Las Vegas more energy efficient means "starting a lot of businesses, a lot of jobs that pay a lot of income. There are lots of examples like that," he said.

Hillary Clinton is set to give several major speeches later this week on global warming that will describe the search for solutions to reducing greenhouse gases from coal and other sources as an economic opportunity rather than as an economic burden.

Utah Democratic Party Chairman Wayne Holland said that message from Hillary Clinton should win her votes in the West — and even in Utah, where coal mining has long been a major industry.

Organizers of Sunday's fund-raisers had expected to take in about $325,000 for Hillary Clinton, but even more was contributed at the sold-out events. Salt Lake County Councilman Randy Horiuchi put the total at $350,000. "It was unbelievable," Horiuchi said.

While these were Hillary Clinton's first fund-raisers in Utah, she had already raised some $103,000 from Utahns through Sept. 30. Although she is the front-runner for the Democratic nomination in national polls, Hillary Clinton trails in Utah.

Both Illinois Sen. Barack Obama and the party's former vice-presidential nominee in 2004, former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards, polled ahead of her in recent statewide surveys of likely Democratic voters. Utah's presidential primary is Feb. 5.

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E-mail: lisa@desnews.com