Bill Clinton

Last night we asked Bill Clinton whether he was ready to become America’s first male First Lady (OK, first gentleman.)

“If the American people are ready to elect [Hillary Clinton], I am," the 61-year-old Mr. Clinton told The Transom. "I’ll do whatever I’m asked to do. I hope they will, because I think it’ll be good for America and the world, but whatever happens…” And then he gave a slight shrug.  read more »

This morning, News Corp. chief Rupert Murdoch sat on a very distinguished panel at the third day of the Clinton Global Initiative: it included Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Prime Minister of Turkey; Jose Ramos Horta, President of Timor-Lest; Stepan Mesic, President of Croatia.

It was a very civil discussion, titled "Building a Global Multi-Ethnic Community." But Mr. Murdoch did face some tough questions from the moderator, former President of Ireland Mary Robinson.  read more »

Nearly 15 years after her disastrous failure to drive a universal health-care coverage policy from one perch in the White House, Hillary Clinton put herself at the center of the health-care debate yesterday as a part of her effort to return there.

In the basement of the Broadlawns Medical Center, a hospital that specializes in treating the uninsured in Des Moines, Ia., Clinton stood in front of backdrop that said "American Health Choices Plan” to detail her long-awaited $110 billion plan mandating that all Americans should qualify for health insurance.  read more »

The next major event on the U.S. political calendar is not in Iowa, New Hampshire or even Florida. It’s actually next week in the Merrimack Valley of Massachusetts, where a the lone open House seat in the country – vacated by six-term Rep. Marty Meehan’s May resignation – will essentially be filled in a Democratic primary. (The primary winner will be the overwhelming favorite against the G.O.P. nominee in what is a solidly Democratic district.)

What makes the contest noteworthy outside of Massachusetts is the identity of the Democratic front-runner: Niki Tsongas, the wife of the late Paul E. Tsongas, the former Massachusetts Senator who very nearly knocked off Bill Clinton in the 1992 Democratic primaries. A decade after his death, Paul Tsongas remains a beloved figure in the district, which is centered in Lowell, the old mill city that he never left (and where a downtown arena now bears his name). That alone figures to be enough to lift Niki Tsongas past her four opponents in next Tuesday’s primary.

Niki Tsongas’ looming elevation to Congress seems like a good excuse to indulge in one of my favorite past-times – the political what if game.

Think back to the 1992 presidential primaries, when every big name Democrat backed off, convinced that George H.W. Bush’s Persian Gulf triumph would render him invincible in the fall. That left a decidedly B-list cast of Democratic aspirants: Clinton, Tsongas, Jerry Brown, Bob Kerrey, Tom Harkin and (for a minute) Doug Wilder. The early thinking had Clinton and Kerrey as the front-runner. Tsongas was ignored.

But his message took hold in New Hampshire, whose lead-off primary was even more important than usual, with Iowa – Harkin’s home state – going uncontested. A string of Clinton scandals in January 1992 – Gennifer Flowers and his Vietnam draft maneuvering, basically – sent the Arkansas Governor’s poll numbers plummeting, and Tsongas surged to the lead in New Hampshire. On primary day, Tsongas won by 7 points. Kerrey was essentially flushed from the race. Clinton, though, was saved by the craftiness of his campaign, which sold him to the media as “the comeback kid,” based on his less-awful-than-expected 26 percent showing in New Hampshire.

The race then went south, where polls showed Tsongas faring surprisingly well in Georgia and Florida. The Clinton campaign, though, launched a slick, well-funded stream of negative ads against Tsongas, portraying him as a cold-hearted foe of Social Security, Medicare, and Israel. It was enough to hand Clinton a seemingly decisive series of Super Tuesday victories, which he followed up with wins in Illinois and Michigan the next week – which prompted Tsongas to suspend his campaign.

Then Clinton inexplicably lost the Connecticut primary to Jerry Brown, one of the biggest upsets in the history of presidential primaries. National Democratic leaders, already worried about Clinton’s “character” issues, panicked and began making noise about recruiting a last-minute alternative to Clinton. New York was next on the calendar and Tsongas made it clear that he would re-enter the race if Clinton lost to Brown again. That’s as far as it went, though: Clinton survived New York and the nomination was his.

But what if he’d been tripped up by Brown again? Or what if he’d lost New Hampshire even more decisively – finishing behind Bob Kerrey, say? A change of just a few thousands New Hampshire votes could have derailed Clinton – and made Tsongas the nominee.

Would the country now know Niki Tsongas as a First Lady? And, instead of the headlines she receives every day, would we now be reading after-thought stories about how Hillary Clinton, the wife of a former presidential candidate, is running for Congress in Arkansas?

“Today is a happy day for me,” said Bill Clinton after lunchtime this afternoon at the Hilton in midtown. He was speaking to clients and brokers for the commercial brokerage firm Cushman & Wakefield.

The reason he’s happy is because tonight he’ll be joining Michael Bloomberg in a joint effort to convince major cities all around the world to become a little bit greener.

Mr. Clinton praised Mayor Bloomberg’s greening plan for the city and discussed its most charged component, the $8 fee that it could cost to drive into midtown during rush hours.  read more »