Alternative careers for Hillary Clinton

Republican Politics, American Style
Published on June 12th in Metro Eireann By Charles Laffiteau

Last week I mentioned an alternative career for Clinton as a US Supreme Court justice that I could foresee her pursuing and that Barack Obama might wish to consider as an alternative to a position in his cabinet. However this option is heavily dependent on how Mrs. Clinton orchestrates her withdrawal from the Democratic nomination contest and how vigorously she and the ex-President campaign for Barack Obama this autumn.
While I could be wrong, I continue to assume that Clintons will do more than pay lip service to the idea that Democratic Party unity and defeating John McCain in November is more important than their personal political ambitions to reclaim their former residence in the White House. But in response to suggestions that Obama might offer Clinton a position in his cabinet instead, the Clintons’ supporters were told to begin campaigning for her to be Obama’s Vice President.
Bill Clinton has been privately voicing support for placing his wife on the ticket for some weeks now because he has calculated that this would be the best alternative as a spot where Hillary could launch another Presidential bid in either 2012 or 2016. While I don’t believe Mrs. Clinton has the necessary CEO skills to be an effective and competent US President, I do agree with her husband that serving as Obama’s Vice President is her best path to winning the Democratic nomination in 2012 or 2016. I discussed both mine and the Clintons’ reasoning in last weeks column, but recent statements made by the Clintons while they were campaigning in South Dakota ahead of the final Democratic state primary severely undercut their campaign to become Obama’s running mate(s).
Let it suffice to say that because I now believe the Clintons’ chances of being on the ticket have gone from slim to none, I would now like to offer some suggestions about what she could do as an alternative. Obviously one option would be for her to return to the US Senate where she has demonstrated the ability to be an effective legislator. She will probably win re-election to her Senate seat easily in 2012 and could then run for President again in 2016 at the end of Obama’s second and final term in office.
Mrs. Clinton has learned a lot during the course of her failed bid for the Democratic nomination this year and it’s likely she won’t repeat all those same mistakes again. Hillary has also demonstrated she has both the tenacity and stamina to run for the presidency, so she would be a formidable opponent for whoever the incumbent Democratic Vice President happened to be or any other Democratic candidate for that matter. But an incumbent Vice President still possesses more advantages in such contests.
The other two options I see for Mrs. Clinton involve her giving up her Presidential aspirations for good and for all much like Ted Kennedy did after he failed to unseat President Jimmy Carter back in 1980. Since that failed race for US President, Senator Kennedy has gone on to become the third longest serving and, more importantly, one of the most distinguished and effective Senators the US has ever known. He is widely respected and held in great esteem by liberals and conservatives from both the Democratic and Republican parties. I believe Hillary Clinton has the intelligence and political savvy to serve as a worthy successor to Kennedy’s mantle should she choose to.
The other option entails Mrs. Clinton becoming willing to give up her political career and with it the national limelight that attends members of the US Congress. But a career as a Supreme Court justice has a number of advantage. The biggest of these is she does not have to go out to raise money and campaign for re-election every six years in addition to putting up with the sometimes harsh media scrutiny that attends any candidate for high political office. Another major plus is that Supreme Court justices serve for life in a position that commands the utmost in respect and dignity from the general public.
Personally, I think Mrs. Clinton is both more capable and better suited to a career involving either of these last two options or serving as Obama’s Secretary of Health and Human Services. I also think Hillary could realize even greater personal satisfaction from any one of these three jobs than she would ever find in the job of US President. My only question is “Would Bill Clinton be satisfied with the prospect of never being able to return to their former residence in the White House except as invited guests?” At this juncture I would have to guess the answer would be “probably not”, but it’s really a bit too soon to tell yet.
So if the Clintons are out then who do I think Barack Obama will pick to be his running mate for the General Election? That’s a tough question and one that is much harder for me to predict than my March 15, 2007 column’s choice of Barack Obama as the best of the potential 2008 US Presidential candidates from either political party. But of course I will nonetheless attempt to do so anyway since Obama’s choice as Vice President will tell us a lot about how much the last few months of trench warfare with the Clintons has changed him as a Presidential candidate.
Given the Irish love for betting, I will begin by first giving you some odds on the various different Democratic Vice Presidential candidates that are being discussed in the news media both in the US and abroad, as well as my personal assessment of these candidates and reasons why they might or might not be selected. I will then follow that up with my appraisal of a couple of “dark horse” candidates that I think would be better choices than the ones being most prominently mentioned by the mainstream political media types. So now you know what to look forward to next week.