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JOHN BRUMMETT: Co-president seeking her third term

Does my wife, by virtue of her 20 years of challenging association with me, possess the relevant experience to become a newspaper columnist on politics?

And consider the case of the service station mechanic down the way. He's been ill lately. Maybe I could get his wife to change my car's points and plugs.


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  • If, that is, Hillary Clinton is to be believed on the matter of a wife getting job-qualifying credit for her husband's experience.

    It's indeed odd that Clinton asserts -- and is generally conceded -- a clear advantage in relevant experience over her Democratic rivals.

    She's been in the U.S. Senate less time than John Edwards, and Edwards actually ran on a national ticket, as the Democratic vice presidential nominee in 2004. Clinton has served in the U.S. Senate twice as long as Barack Obama -- but, then, Obama did seven years as an Illinois state senator. That ought to count for something, especially considering that Hillary never held elected office herself before becoming a U.S. senator from New York in 2001.

    Before going to the White House with her husband, Clinton had been a corporate lawyer and a Wal-Mart board member. True, she'd ventured out as first lady of Arkansas, in 1983, via her husband's appointment, to head a commission drafting new curriculum and performance standards for the state's public schools. But I'm not sure anyone wants to say that mandating extra units of math and science commends one for the American presidency.

    We haven't even brought up U.S. Sens. Joe Biden and Chris Dodd, Democratic presidential also-rans who have it all over Clinton when it comes to time and foreign policy experience in the Senate.

    The point is that Hillary presumes to get credited with relevant experience for what her husband achieved. And she seeks and seems to get that credit singularly, even historically.

    No other president's wife, save perhaps Eleanor Roosevelt, would presume to lay any remotely similar claim, much less be conceded it. Laura Bush does not suggest that she possesses that kind of experience. Her mother-in-law didn't. Nor did Nancy Reagan, or Rosalyn Carter, or Betty Ford.

    Those were, or are, strong, intelligent and competent women. But they didn't operate as West Wing co-presidents. Whatever influence they had -- and it was surely great at times -- came personally through those powerfully intimate spousal channels.

    These women didn't take charge of health care. They didn't get sold by their husbands as the other half of a two-for-one presidential deal.

    Hillary stands before us to ask for an exclusive third term of a presidency she essentially claims to have shared for two previous terms with a guy who was the vote-getting front man.

    When Clinton speaks of health care, she does so as one who actually once tried to run it, and perhaps learned valuable and applicable lessons. When she speaks of trade, she does so as one who didn't want her husband to press NAFTA. When she ponders foreign relations, or the pressures between third-way and old-way domestic Democratic politics, she does so as one who has pondered them in active and essentially equal partnership with an internationally popular former president who has long navigated that tight rope between third-way and old-way Democratic politics.

    Of all the Democratic candidates, Clinton offers the least experience in terms of a formal resume. But, off paper, she has the most actual and practical experience.

    She can't actually write on that resume -- co-president, 1993-2001. But she can plainly imply it.

    And a lot of people seem to be buying it.

    John Brummett is an award-winning columnist for the Arkansas News Bureau in Little Rock and author of "High Wire," a book about Bill Clinton's first year as president. His e-mail address is jbrummett@ arkansasnews.com.

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    William Mosley wrote on December 11, 2007 12:14 PM: I was surprised, amazed is probably a better word, to see a quote in a recent Maureen Dowd column that, "The last thing Hillary did on her own was get admitted to Yale Law!" Coming from one of the most liberal columnists for the most liberal newspaper in America, it was refreshing to say the least.

    I can't believe that people are actually buying her disingenuous claim of experience! Arguable, she is the least experienced of the democratic candidates. Running a "war room" overseeing "bimbo eruptions" and going on elephant rides with her daughter during Chelsa's spring break is not presidential experience.

    My ex-wife was married to me, an air traffic controller, for sixteen years; using Hillary's convoluted logic, my ex was qualified to run the FAA!


    Robert wrote on December 07, 2007 02:42 PM: And all of you below think the Bush administration is angelic compared to her? Keep drinking your Kool-Aid.....


    Andrew P wrote on December 02, 2007 10:34 PM: I think the Hildabeast has peaked in the polls. If she loses in Iowa, she is in deep trouble. And if Obama wins IA and NH, that could throw the race wide open again, and give Democratic voters a reason to give the second tier candidates Biden and Dodd a second look.


    Vince wrote on December 02, 2007 12:57 PM: Does Marrying Bill Clinton Qualify Someone To Be President?
    Hillary Clinton has practically been anointed by the media as our next President, despite the fact that her run at the presidency is based entirely on being Bill Clinton's wife.

    If Bubba had divorced the Beast and married Monica, Hillary would be a footnote.

    But isn't Hillary Clinton a brilliant politician in her own right?

    She has been involved in more scandals than the whole rest of the Democratic and Republican fields combined, she's a participant in an off-putting sham marriage, she has minimal charisma, she is one of the most polarizing figures in politics, she has a reputation as a shameless liar, and in the Senate, she has accomplished NOTHING. She has gotten away with taking bribes and had she been Hillary Jones, ordinary person, as opposed to Hillary Clinton, First Lady, she would have ended up in a jail cell over White Water.

    The Beast comes across as exactly what she is: An amoral shrew who's willing to lie about anything and everything, destroy the lives of people who get in her way, and help cover up and enable the frequent affairs of her husband, all because she has an all-consuming urge to achieve power for power's sake.

    Since that's the case, don't Americans deserve better than a leader of the free world whose chief qualification for the job is being Mrs. Bill Clinton?

    THE BEAST IS “UNDER-QUALIFIED”
    You can vote for her because….
    You like her,
    You like Bubba,
    Because she's a dem,
    Because she's a woman,
    Because she can make millions with a tiny investment,
    Because she has copies of your FBI file,
    Because she will have the IRS audit you,
    But... you can not vote for her because she is the most qualified.


    Vince wrote on December 02, 2007 12:53 PM: Does Marrying Bill Clinton Qualify Someone To Be President?

    Hillary Clinton has practically been anointed by the media as our next President, despite the fact that her run at the presidency is based entirely on being Bill Clinton's wife.
    If Bubba had divorced the Beast and married Monica, Hillary would be a footnote.
    But isn't Hillary Clinton a brilliant politician in her own right? She has been involved in more scandals than the whole rest of the Democratic and Republican fields combined, she's a participant in an off-putting sham marriage, she has minimal charisma, she is one of the most polarizing figures in politics, she has a reputation as a shameless liar, and in the Senate, she has accomplished NOTHING. She has gotten away with taking bribes and had she been Hillary Jones, ordinary person, as opposed to Hillary Clinton, First Lady, she would have ended up in a jail cell over White Water.
    The Beast comes across as exactly what she is: An amoral shrew who's willing to lie about anything and everything, destroy the lives of people who get in her way, and help cover up and enable the frequent affairs of her husband, all because she has an all-consuming urge to achieve power for power's sake.
    Since that's the case, don't Americans deserve better than a leader of the free world whose chief qualification for the job is being Mrs. Bill Clinton?

    THE BEAST IS “UNDER-QUALIFIED”

    You can vote for her because….
    You like her,
    You like Bubba,
    Because she's a dem,
    Because she's a woman,
    Because she can make millions with a tiny investment,
    Because she has copies of your FBI file,
    Because she will have the IRS audit you,

    But you can not vote for her because she is the most qualified.


    John Vincent wrote on December 02, 2007 12:41 PM: Ma & Pa Clintoon have lived an entire lifetime of deceitfulness from Arkansas to Washington DC to New York and around the world. Lies, deceit, corruption and crime follow them like a cloud of filth follows Pigpen in the comic strip Peanuts. Whether it be planted questions at Dim & Pub debates, Bubba’s meaning of the word “is”, the Beast’s “smartest woman in the world” atypical response: “I don’t recall” or “I was unaware or didn’t know”, these two shysters should be in jail, not in the White House which they thoroughly trashed last time there.


    Gary M wrote on December 02, 2007 11:38 AM: She made a mess out of health care reform- a job for which she was totally unqualified for. She got it only because she was married to someone. Having gotten it for no good reason, she proceeded to act like she knew better than everyone else, threatening to demonize anyone who got in her way, even her Democratic allies.
    Maybe that's why Bob Boorstin, who worked with her on it, says she's one of the most self-righteous people he's ever met. She got involved in the trashing of the Travel Office employees, too.
    In 1994, the Democrats lost control of the House for the first time in 40 years, in part because of her health care reform.
    All she does is grandstand, give canned answers and act like everyone is supposed to hand her the Oval Office because she's married to Bill.
    Bush got in because of who he's related to, and now a great many people who are really turned off by him are eager to make the very same mistake with Bill Clinton's wife.


    Jack Yowell wrote on December 02, 2007 10:44 AM: In my opinion she murdered Vince Foster. When Vince Foster was found in Marcy Park he had carpet fibers all over his clothing. Hillary had just had new carpet installed in her apartment. There was no report of anyone ever trying to match the fibers found on Vince Foster with the fibers from Hillary's new carpet. AND HILLARY KNEW VINCE FOSTER WAS DESPONDENT AND FIXING TO "SPILL THE THE BEANS ON THE ROSE LAW FIRM AND THEIR COMPLICITY".


    tim wrote on December 02, 2007 10:40 AM: does anyone remember the first clinton. the largest tax hike in history,whitewater,sex in the oval office,ruby ridge,waco,janet reno firing over 80 prosecuters,not a word,renting out the lincoln bedroom to hollywood buddies,failed health care plan,suicides and friends dying mysteriously,impeached and disbarred,gun bans and people acually want them back in the white house? not me,never shes a socialist in sheeps clothing and if she gets elected were screwed.


    Steve wrote on December 02, 2007 10:09 AM: Jterrell,

    I will vote and I think that filthy, disgusting, incompetent, liar Clinton was NOT a "good" president nor a human being. We not only had to worry about the interns, we also had to worry about people who knew too much about the criminal Clinton clan shooting themselves in their office and ending up in a park, being killed in a helicoptor crash but having a bullet wound in their head, having "mysterious" heart attacks when they were in good health, etc.


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