Is the Left Abandoning Hillary?

In this week's TIME, Joe Klein makes the case for the Democrats to stop looking to Hillary as their party's presidential nominee for 2008.

Sunday, May. 08, 2005

Hillary in 2008? No Way!

Why the former First Lady should stay in the Senate

By JOE KLEIN

I was having a fascinating conversation with a Middle East expert about the intricacies of Israel's disengagement from Gaza when I noticed the fellow growing impatient. "Enough of this," he said. "What about Hillary?" Welcome to my life. In airports, on checkout lines, at the doctor's office: "What about Hillary?" (Everywhere except in Washington, where everyone "knows" she's running.) I shrug, I try to avoid the question, I say it's too early—and it is. But you want to know too, right? So here it is. I like Senator Clinton. She has a wicked, ironic sense of humor (in private) and a great raucous belly laugh. She is smart and solid; she inspires tremendous loyalty among those who work for her. She is not quite as creative a policy thinker as her husband, but she easily masters difficult issues—her newfound grasp of military matters has impressed colleagues of both parties on the Armed Services Committee—and she is not even vaguely the left-wing harridan portrayed by the Precambrian right. I also think that a Clinton presidential candidacy in 2008 would be a disaster on many levels.

...It would doubtless be a circus, a revisitation of the carnival ugliness that infested public life in the 1990s.

...[S]he has some very real political limitations. She has a clenched, wary public presence, which won't work well in an electorate that prizes aw-shucks informality; she isn't a particularly warm or eloquent speaker, especially in front of large audiences.

...It will take a brilliant politician to create a credible feminine presidential style. So far, Senator Clinton hasn't shown the ease or creativity necessary to break the ultimate glass ceiling.

And then there is her husband, a one-man supermarket tabloid.

...But there is another problem: What role would the big guy play in a Hillary Clinton Administration? Would he reform health care? Does anyone believe that a man with such a huge personality would have a less active role in her Administration than she had in his?

...The Clinton line in 1992 was, Buy one, get one free. We've already had that co-presidency—for its full, constitutional eight years.
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Klein doesn't like the idea of the presidency being bandied between the Clintons and the Bushes, "with stale, familiar corps of retainers, supporters and enemies."

I don't like the idea that the 2008 election is a topic of discussion now.

IT'S TOO SOON!

That said, I would love to see Hillary run. The political scene couldn't get much sweeter than mad Dr. Dean as head of the DNC, and Hillary at the top of the ticket.

Well, maybe Dennis Kucinich at the top. That would be sweeter, but not by much.