[Starman]

Is her husband Bill helping or hurting her chances? Making her appear less capable and needing his assistance? Causing voters to wonder too much whether he will or won't try another Lewinski scenario? Or is all this totally irrelevant?

[JoeCanada76]

Is her husband Bill helping or hurting her chances? Making her appear less capable and needing his assistance? Causing voters to wonder too much whether he will or won't try another Lewinski scenario? Or is all this totally irrelevant?

Actually when bill clinton was in office there were many times when the public and media felt that bill was being a assisted by hillary. That bill would not have had so much success without his wife.

So I think it is totally irrevelevant and Bill is just showing support to his wife and he does have the popularity that might help Hillary, but hillary is the one with the smarts.

Joe

[tomder55]

It is a scary thought having him stalking the halls of the White House with nothing to do .

Two minds on this.

1. Bill is the more seasoned political creature. Hillary brings his savvy and his political machine with him . As you will notice ,her team of players are the same group that was on Bill's staff .

2. But on the negative side for her he sucks the oxygen out of the air wherever he goes. Twice already in this campaign they have been together in public where she appeared to be the prop .

Now when she was first lady Bill tried initially to use her as a sort of co-President . He gave her the task to manage one of his major initiatives... health care reform . She botched it badly . It really doesn't matter if you agree with her concepts or not. She never seriously got a proposal advanced to congressional debate. After that she was placed into the more traditional role that First ladies usually play .Her most important contribution to the Clinton Presidency was her management of damage control due to all of Bill's indiscretions.

As a Senator to NY ;being a resident I can tell you she has not done much . Her total political experience has been her 1 term as Senator that she got by riding Bill's coat tails.(her second term doesn't count because all she's done is campaign for the Presidency ).

To sum it up... her political existence is dependent on Bill Clinton. It is his charisma that got her where she is at and all she does is try to advance his agenda. She is fortunate that he has a permanent base of groupies.

[Dark_crow]

Is her husband Bill helping or hurting her chances? Making her appear less capable and needing his assistance? Causing voters to wonder too much whether he will or won't try another Lewinski scenario? Or is all this totally irrelevant?

Does Hillary have a “Snowballs chance in…” - I don’t think so.

[ETWolverine]

As a Senator to NY ;being a resident I can tell you she has not done much . Her total political experience has been her 1 term as Senator that she got by riding Bill's coat tails.(her second term doesn't count because all she's done is campaign for the Presidency ).

I disagree with you on one minor point, Tom, though I admit it is a disagreement without any serious meaning.

Unlike most of the Democratic hopeless hopefuls, Hillary has actually been available for the vast majority of Senatorial votes during her second term. I think I saw an article that said she had been available for 16 of the last 18 votes in the Senate. That's a pretty good record by any accounting. Give her credit for that much, at least.

However, that doesn't mean she's actually accomplished anything during either of her two terms. She hasn't. So it really is a disagreement without a difference.

Elliot

[tomder55]

Of course she was there . Where was she going to go?. Home to Bill at Chappaqua ?

Yeah ,I remember how all the Democrats running for President showed up for a vote and then took individual private jets to their debate in South Carolina .



Her face is a map of the world
Is a map of the world
You can see she's a beautiful girl
She's a beautiful girl
And everything around her is a silver pool of light
The people who surround her feel the benefit of it
It makes you calm
She holds you captivated in her palm

Suddenly I see (Suddenly I see)
This is what I wanna be
Suddenly I see (Suddenly I see)
Why the hell it means so much to me

I feel like walking the world
Like walking the world
You can hear she's a beautiful girl
She's a beautiful girl
She fills up every corner like she's born in black and white
Makes you feel warmer when you're trying to remember
What you heard
She likes to leave you hanging on her word

Suddenly I see (Suddenly I see)
This is what I wanna be
Suddenly I see (Suddenly I see)
Why the hell it means so much to me
. KT Tunstall

[ETWolverine]

Here's my take on this.

Bill is still the darling of the media, and it is very much because of Bill that Hillary is cut so much slack by the media. That tells in her favor.

Furthermore, having Bill in her corner means having one of the best political strategists in modern history to guide her.

Notice that her voice has become somewhat less shrill over the past year or so? That's Bill's coaching. Notice her ability to straddle the fence on most issues? That's Bill's coaching, along with the media cutting her slack because of Bill.

I have to say that I disagree with Dark Crow on this one. I think Hillary has a very good chance of becoming President. Unfortunately. She will almost certainly win the Democratic primary. The only viable alternative to her within the Dem party is Obama, and of the two, Hillary is more experienced... and she certainly has experience of having been in the White House and having dealt with the upper echelons of US society that Obama does not. Obama also doesn't have the political strategy experience that Bill brings to the table. So Hillary will kick Obama's butt in the primary.

So it comes down to who the Reps put up against Hillary. The real choices are Rudy and Thompson, in my opinion. McCain, the former favorite is leaking money badly. He may not even make it to the primary, and even if he does, the rank-and-file Reps don't like him. He'll lose badly. Romney, as much as I like the guy, is not a real contender. So Its Rudy and Thompson, and they seem equally popuklar to me.

If Thompson wins the primary, it will be a real horse race between Hillary and Fred, and I'd say that the result could go either way. Thompson is popular ight now, but his popularity stems primarily from his acting, not his senatorial history. Hillary can exploit that. On the other hand, Thompson DOES have a strong legislative voting record to point to, compared to Hillary. And between the two, Thompson would wipe the floor with Hillary in a debate, and is the better speech-maker. And there are the inevitable comparisons to another actor/politician named Ronald Reagan that work in Thompson's favor. I think Fred has the advantage, but it could go either way.

If Rudy wins the primary, I think he becomes the next President. He's much more popular that Hillary, has a history of strength on both crime and terrorism (even before 9/11). While he has some weaknesses on social issues, I think that most Reps and quite a few Dems would back him over Hillary, if it came down to the two of them. And just like in 2004 and 2006, the most important issue on people's minds is terrorism and the War in Iraq. I think more people trust Rudy on those issues than Hillary.

But don't count Hillary out. Her chances are not bad. She has lots of advantages, including a huge war chest, great political stretegists, great name recognition, and support from the media. It will come down to her ability to use those advantages against opponents who are equally popular and recognizable.

Elliot

[Dark_crow]

One major hurdle... she is still a woman

[tomder55]

I don't know how to judge this campaign because we are in unchartered territory due to the States advancing the date of their primaries. I think a huge war chest will give her a considerable advantage than say Howard Dean had last time. The fact that almost all of the candidates are ignoring the retail campaigning that they would've normally had to do in Iowa and NH and are trying to go wholesale changes the dynamics.

But on the positive ;early candidate selection gives them a chance to have their team established early . Rudy has gone a long way recently in announcing his foreign policy and judicial teams. The names are impressive and he has gone up a notch or 2 in my book recently. Hillary's team is of course already established since all she had to do is beacon and all the Clintonistas mobilized .

[ETWolverine]

One major hurdle...she is still a woman

Really? How can you tell?

And her popularity would seem to indicate that that is not the major hurdle you think it is. She's way ahead of where Geraldine Ferraro was when she ran for VP.

[Dark_crow]

Really? How can you tell?

And her popularity would seem to indicate that that is not the major hurdle you think it is. She's way ahead of where Geraldine Ferraro was when she ran for VP.

I agree with your analysis as to her advantages, but I tend to believe that she, as a female, will lose a lot of the Hispanic vote that the other attributes you spelled out might have otherwise brought out. Let's see how she does on the main issues, she had been quite on. Tonight may give us some better indications

[tomder55]

Tonight may give us some better indications

Yeah I wonder how many probing question CNN will divine from the stack of YouTube entries ?

[GoldieMae]

Bill is helping her. If it weren't for Bill, she'd be some has-been of counsel in a two-bit Arkansas law firm that nobody would have heard of but for a scandal.

Bill Clinton's the only hope she's got.

He is her ticket to the nostalgia voters: They want him back, and she's the next best thing.

Without him, she is a lifeless bag. I live in an area inundated with Dems, and what I can gather from them, they don't like Hillary because of the wonderful things she does. They like her because she is Bill Clinton's wife and they have faulty memories of the things he's done.

Her voice is grating, her attitude is unfriendly and unbecoming, and when she speaks, unless she's using his speech writers, she comes across as lackluster in the intelligence department.

If she wins the primary, it'll open a can of worms for a really nasty election. The media will support her because they love Bill. We'll be inundated with the whole "first woman as president" oohs and aahs, etc. And we'll have to relive the "vast right wing conspiracy" junk. Regardless, without Bill Clinton's charisma, she wouldn't be there, and she knows it.

[tomder55]

she'd be some has-been of counsel in a two-bit Arkansas law firm that nobody would have heard of but for a scandal.

... and most likely indicted since she would not have been able to hide the firms records in the White House.

[Starman]

I agree with your analysis as to her advantages, but I tend to believe that she, as a female, will lose a lot of the Hispanic vote that the other attributes you spelled out might have otherwise brought out. Let's see how she does on the main issues, she had been quite on. Tonight may give us some better indications

List of elected or appointed female heads of state - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Hispanics have had female heads of state such as the Spaniard Isabella of Castile the popular Argentinean Evita Peron and Isabel Martínez de Perón, the Ecuadorian Rosalía Arteagathe, the Bolivian Lidia Gueiler Tejada, the Puerto Rican Sila Maria Calderon, the Panamanian Mireya Moscoso. The Chilean Michelle Bachelet, and the Nicaraguan Violeta Barrios de Chamorro who was the first democratically elected female president in the Americas.

So if Hispanics don't vote for Hilary it isn't because she's female.

Lidia Gueiler Tejada - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Sila María Calderón - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Violeta Chamorro - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Mireya Moscoso - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Michelle Bachelet - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Rosalía Arteaga - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Isabella of Castile - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Isabel Martínez de Perón - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[Choux]

My opinion is that Bill is an asset on the campaign trail.. Couple of reasons.

Women like Bill.

Bill is a reminder of the good old days before Bush trashed America and got America involved in a hopeless war as he waged it. He is a reminder of Democratic moderate approach compared to Bush's radical war of adventurism that was a complete failure with no possible positive exit strategy. Americans don't want "Endless War"; that's why Bush's approval rating is at 25% in some polls. He is losing Iraq and losing Afthanistan, and according to Chernoff, his Homeland Security chum, Jihadists are gong to attack America this summer.

It is all about the public's perception of politicians. NOw, Republicans, because of the failres of the Bush administration, are percienved in a very negative light because of the radical actions in foreign and domestic arenas.

[ETWolverine]

Bill is a reminder of the good old days before Bush trashed America and got America involved in a hopeless war as he waged it. He is a reminder of Democratic moderate approach compared to Bush's radical war of adventurism that was a complete failure with no possible positive exit strategy. Americans don't want "Endless War"; that's why Bush's approval rating is at 25% in some polls. He is losing Iraq and losing Afthanistan, and according to Chernoff, his Homeland Security chum, Jihadists are gong to attack America this summer.

He's also a reminder that we could have avoided the entire war and the 9/11 attack if he had taken out Osama bin Laden when he had the multiple chances to do so, been more responsive to the first WTC attack, the Marine Barracks attack, the USS Cole attack, the attacks on the embassies in Africa, his lack of response to provocations by Saddam Hussein, and his overall piss-poor response in Bosnia.

It is all about the public's perception of politicians. NOw, Republicans, because of the failres of the Bush administration, are percienved in a very negative light because of the radical actions in foreign and domestic arenas.

I agree, it is all about public perception. And if you think that the public is looking forward to the perceptions of another 4 years of Clintons in the White House, and the ensuing sex-and-hamburger jokes in the international community, you are being very naïve. Bush may be hated and feared around the world as a loose cannon and a cowboy, and for his "lack of diplomatic savvy", but he's not the walking sex joke that Clinton was.

That said, I think that Bill is more of an asset to Hillary right now than a hindrance. But that is true right now while she is working on the Demiocratic primary. That could very well change when it comes time for her to wage the general erection... er... I meant election campaign. (See how easy it is for the Republicans to conjure up an image that makes Bill look bad?)

And about Hillary lifting the carpets to see what's lying under the rugs... I wonder if there's any DNA evidence still there from the good old days of Monica. (See?)

Elliot

[BABRAM]

Outside of his infidelity issue which was Hillary's choice to continue her relationship with her husband, Bill can't hurt Hillary's chances at Presidency. The past few years Bill has spent part of the time in the public eye with Bush Sr.. They do a lot of charity good together and that can only strengthen Hillary's chances. Of course Bill brings supportive experience and a voice, the public desire for change (if needed or not), and the fact he was popular with the majority of the public during his two terms.



Bobby