Bill Clinton 2008?

There are a lot of stories in the press about Bill Clinton and his role in the campaign of his wife, Hillary Clinton. I think not since...well...Hillary Clinton in 1992 has a campaign spouse been so heavily in the spot-light - and over this past week - actually taken some of that spotlight away from the candidate themselves. It was somewhat inevitable since that spouse is a former President, but former President Clinton has done much more, well beyond simply *being* a campaign spouse, to put himself in the headlines on behalf of his wife's campaign.

And noone seems to be fooled about exactly what he's doing. Bill Clinton seems to have been the attack dog of the Clinton campaign, and it seems to have hurt more than it helped. There's news today that unofficial Clinton advisors are seriouslly counselling the candidate to get Bill to stop being such a headline-grabber, because he's not doing it positively. He's the source of the negative campaign against Obama, and so I think much of the blame for the current negative tone of the campaign rests on his shoulders.

But it rests on Hillary's too. For two people who share a bed, I don't think you can easily dismiss the comments of your spouse as not your own. If you disapproved of the comment you'd ask them to stop. So it leads me to believe that Hillary's quite happy to have Bill keep hitting Obama and get headlines because of it, while Hillary retains a higher road (lowered after the CNN debate last week.)

It's 'two for the price of one' all over again. It's as though Bill Clinton is running for President again. But the voters rejected 'two for the price of one' back in the first two years of the Bill Clinton presidency. I don't think it was just Hillary they were rejecting in that... Expect to see less of Bill Clinton on the campaign trail now that his tactics haven't stopped Clinton from receiving a South Carolina crushing.