Hillary’s current favorability rating at 62% [View All]

I must say, though I was no fan of Hillary during the primaries, I now think she was an inspired choice for SoS. You go, Hillary!

http://theplumline.whorunsgov.com/president-obama/hillary-popular-again/

Hillary, Popular Again


The headline on the new Gallup poll is that Hillary Clinton is now more popular than Barack Obama, but that’s not all that surprising, given that Obama runs the place and is subject to relentless scrutiny and criticism.

More interesting, I think, is that Hillary’s current favorability rating of 62% is now among her highest ever, rivaled only by her popularity amid impeachment in the late 1990s.

Hillary’s swings in image and popularity over the years really are truly remarkable, as longtime Hillary-watchers know. After the Hillarycare debacle and the various “scandals” to best the Clintons in the mid 1990s — may of which were fictions kept alive by the mainstream press — her popularity nose dived and she became a figure that stoked intensely partisan passions across the country.

The impeachment of her husband turned her into an object of national sympathy and a symbol of female perseverence in the face of a hostile, male-dominated political culture. But then, when she moved to New York to run for Senate, she had to muster incredible care and skill to diffuse suspicions about her new political intentions, persuading New Yorkers to send a non-native to the upper chamber.

Once in the Senate, she skillfully managed the transition from full-time campaigner to the role of quiet, unassuming work-horse Senator. As a presidential candidate, she successfully persuaded the electorate of her toughness and strength, and even became a blue-collar heroine of sorts — an achievement that was anything but assured, given her pedigree. But the hard edge of her campaign seemed to cast her back in the role of political lightening rod, at least to her detractors among Dems.

Now she’s hugely popular again, having carved out a role as a tough-minded Secretary of State who’s also a low-profile and dutiful team player. All of which is to say that Hillary seems at her best in a less overtly political role as a policy workhorse — yet another argument supporting the notion that she has no intention whatsoever of running for President.