PATRICIA MURPHY: Hillary, Please Leave Bill at Home.
Take your husband to work day has taken a turn for the worse in Hillary Clinton’s world. Having Bill around used to seem like such a good thing. He survived scandal with high approval ratings and after leaving the White House, went on to create a foundation that did good things for needy people all around the world. Bypass surgery and grandfather-hood made him all the more human. Republicans such as George H.W. Bush grew to love him, while Democrats embraced him as the “explainer in chief.” What wasn’t to love?
Donald Trump changed all that when he attacked Bill Clinton as “one of the great woman abusers of all time.” And with that, he broke the seal on the long dormant Clintonian ick that polite political society had locked away in a vault, never to be exhumed until the 42nd president’s obituaries are written to include the whole unpleasant sideshow.
Smart move by Trump. Plus:
Making other people look good is not Bill Clinton’s jam.
As far back his first term in the White House, Democrats suffered catastrophic losses in the 1994 midterm elections — losing 54 House seats, eight Senate seats and 10 governors mansions. Two years later, Clinton won re-election, but his fellow Democrats weren’t all so lucky. They picked up two House seats, but also lost two Senate seats. In Arkansas, Clinton’s successor as governor was forced to resign after a Whitewater- related felony conviction. Republican Lt. Gov. Mike Huckabee became governor instead.
By 2000, after the Monica Lewinsky affair and a disastrous impeachment effort from Republicans, Clinton’s vice president, Al Gore, lost his own bid for the White House, even as Bill Clinton rode into the sunset with 70-plus percent approval ratings. He entered private life, but continued to joyously campaign for Democrats across the country whenever they called. The love was rarely transferable.
In 2008, when Hillary Clinton ran for president, her campaign dispatched her husband to reach voters they worried wouldn’t go for Hillary without a nudge from Bill. But in state after state where Bubba was supposed to be the secret weapon (think the entire Deep South) his wife lost — by a lot.
His latest bust was in 2014, when a slew of former Clinton associates, all Democrats, were on the ballot in Arkansas. His former driver was running for governor. His political mentor’s son was up for re-election to the Senate. His old Federal Emergency Management Agency chief was running for House, as was one of his earliest supporters for president. He went on eight “Billgramages” to Arkansas to campaign for the ticket, only for them all to lose by 10 points or more.
Ouch.