Democratic rivals target the Clinton years

Boston Globe: Democratic rivals target the Clinton years
Senator makes record a campaign theme
By Marcella Bombardieri
Globe Staff / November 14, 2007

ONAWA, Iowa - Bill Clinton's growing visibility on the campaign trail in recent days has brought star power to his wife's candidacy, but is also increasingly inviting serious criticism of his presidency from her rivals. In the past week, the Democratic nomination fight has become more of a referendum on the Clinton years and whether Bill Clinton brought the good life to middle-class Americans or squandered eight years in compromise and scandal.

John Edwards told 9,000 Democratic activists in Des Moines on Saturday night that corruption has been building in Washington for decades, a period that conspicuously encompasses the Clinton years. In Sioux City the day before, Barack Obama sharply criticized the Clintons' failure to overhaul healthcare, saying "they did it in the wrong way" by devising their plan in secret, making it easier for the insurance industry to label it as socialized medicine.

But Hillary Clinton is confident enough about the Clinton administration's record to make it a central theme of her campaign, boasting of the balanced budget and the economic growth, along with more obscure accomplishments such as bringing electronic medical records to the Veterans Administration. She is also more frequently dispatching the former president as her chief surrogate on the stump, with solo appearances by Bill Clinton in Iowa last Thursday, South Carolina on Monday, and New Hampshire this Friday....

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The latest poll suggests that two-thirds of Americans, and an even higher percentage of Democrats, approve of the way he handled his presidency, between 1993 and 2001. But he also draws right-wing enmity like no one else....

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Of the Democratic candidates, Edwards is most sweeping in his condemnation of what he calls the corrupt political system and the Clintons' place in it. He has assailed Hillary Clinton for taking money from Washington lobbyists, points out that she is the favored candidate of Wall Street, and tells Democrats on the stump that they can't swap corporate Republicans with corporate Democrats and really reform government.

Obama has most squarely taken on the Bill Clinton legacy, telling Fox News that part of the change he represents is "generational," because "Senator Clinton and others have been fighting some of the same fights since the '60s." Speaking at the Jefferson Jackson dinner in Des Moines on Saturday, Obama won thunderous applause when he declared, "Triangulating and poll-driven positions, because we're worried about what Mitt or Rudy might say about us, just won't do." The concept of triangulation is a clear reference to Bill Clinton's governing strategy to stake out the middle ground between the Democrats and Republicans in Congress on issues....

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But Jay Carson, a spokesman for Hillary Clinton and former communications director for Bill Clinton, said the former president is so popular that candidates who attack him will be hurt. "There is no better person in your corner in the Democratic primary," he said....

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