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[waltonme]

Marginally recovered from his quadruple bypass, Clinton has jumped into the Kerry campaign and begun making appearances. Do you think this will help or hinder Kerry in the long run? According to a CNN article on the issue http://www.cnn.com/2004/ ( Read more... )

Comments

[jenngordon]

It was a while ago, but I remember seeing Bill Clinton on Letterman and Oprah shortly after the release of his book. Politically, he spoke about his book and about what he believes the Democratic party can do for America. He spoke mainly about what he achieved in office, and how Bush has reversed a lot of his gains. He did say that he supported Kerry and thought that he would make a good president, but for some reason I felt that he was hesitant about showering Kerry with compliments. He seemed more in favor of democratic policies and how he thinks things should be done, but never directly said that he thinks John Kerry will do things right. I definitely think that Clinton is a huge asset to Kerry because Clinton is well-liked by the majority of Americans, even with a sex scandal under his belt (no pun intended). When we watched the presidential debate between George Bush, Sr., Clinton, and Perot, it was hard to perceive Clinton as anything but an intelligent man who is able and determined to balance the budget and improve America. And he did. Even if Clinton were to give 100% effort into helping Kerry (which I doubt he is, to agree with you), I still don't think that will get Kerry elected for the simple reason that Kerry is not Clinton. If you can remember the "Triangulation" reading, Clinton was the one who really brought that into play and made it his most effective campaign tool. G.W. Bush used it in 2000 to his advantage, but I don't feel Kerry has used it effectively, if at all, in this campaign (I won't count his stance on Iraq; it's not a new issue). People don't see Clinton and Kerry in the same light because they have two totally different personalities. While both are extremely intelligent, Clinton has much more charisma that made him pleasing to most Americans, especially women. Kerry has been dubbed as bland and lacking personality. Personally, I would prefer Clinton to run again over Kerry if the Constitution allowed it. As I stated earlier, Clinton seemed hesitant in showering Kerry with compliments and almost all of his support to the Democratic party as a whole. This could go along with your theory of Hillary wanting to run in 2008, trying to defeat an incumbant, but I think it might just be a lack of confidence. I'm sure Clinton supports Kerry and his administration in this election over Bush, but it is hard to doubt that Clinton is as unsure as to what Kerry will do if elected as we are. One bit of humor I remember from the Letterman show was Letterman asking Clinton how many copies his book sold in the first week, and Clinton gave a relatively high number that I'm sure any writer would be happy with. Then Letterman asked how many copies Hillary's book had sold, and she had sold more than twice as many in one day than he had since its release until that show (a couple weeks roughly). I guess that says something about interest in American politicians!