Obama Luring Ex-Clinton Aides

When Deval Patrick called on a sea of nearly 10,000 people to support Barack Obama for president, he became only the latest in a series of high-profile officials from Bill Clinton's administration endorsing, advising, or working for Obama, Hillary Clinton's rival for the Democratic nomination.

Clinton enjoys the backing of much of her husband's political machine and her own ultra-loyal staff from the 1990s, and both groups have helped build an air of inevitability about her winning the nomination. But a significant group of former Clinton advisers and officials have gone the other way.

Former energy and transportation secretary Federico Peña, former commerce secretary William Daley, foreign policy gurus Anthony Lake and Susan Rice, former Navy secretary Richard Danzig, and women's advocate Betsy Myers are among those who served Bill Clinton but have taken Obama's side. Patrick, who was assistant attorney general for civil rights, endorsed him at rally on Boston Common on Tuesday night.

In interviews this week, half a dozen Obama supporters with Clinton roots said they see the 46-year-old, first-term Illinois senator as the face of the future and the best hope for the party. While they don't directly criticize Clinton, they said that another Clinton presidency would not represent enough of a change in American politics or its image in the world. Some also said she is too divisive to beat the Republican nominee or to govern effectively.

"One of the chief things that would energize a very dispirited Republican Party is Hillary Clinton on the ticket," said Eric Holder, who was second-in-command at the Justice Department in the late 1990s and who likens Obama to John F. Kennedy.

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2007/10/25/obama_luring_ex_bill_clinton_aides/