Buy one, get one free

23 April 2007 |permalink | email article

When Bill Clinton first ran for president in 1992 he touted the slogan, “buy one, get one free” – a reference to his wife, Hillary Rodham Clinton. The leading Democrat presidential candidate effectively repeated that slogan on Saturday in Marshalltown, Iowa town hall meeting.

But her leadership of an administrative effort in 1993 to overhaul the nation’s health care system failed the co-presidency test.

Answering a question about what role the former president might play in her administration ’s role, she said he would be a global ambassador to repair the damaged U.S. image abroad if she is elected.

“I can’t think of a better cheerleader for America than Bill Clinton, can you?”

He is already been playing a very visible role, calling major donors and raising money to fend off a major challenge from Barack Obama, closing the gap in some major polls.

The former president has made no secret of his availability to be a player in a new Clinton administration. But, trying to soften the two-for-one image, he told CNN’s Larry King last week that “she’ll be the president. She’ll make the decisions.” That remains to be seen.   

Note the French presidential runoff election on May 6 between frontrunning conservative Nicholas Sarkozy and Socialist Segolene Royal, a battle that could make her the country’s first female leader.

Royal has skyrocketed in popularity, portraying herself as the mother–protector of France, with a feminist campaign deeply anti-Bush and aimed at voters tired of paternalistic men with a monthslong “listening campaign” nationwide, an early staple of Clinton’s campaigns.

Women made up 54 percent of the U.S. electorate in 2004, and Clinton got 74 percent of the female voters in winning re-election last year. But her negatives remain high and one question is whether, like Royal, she too will be perceived as a mother- protector.


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