Some fear the other Clinton's behavior may hurt Democrats
CAMPAIGN '08
Critics say the former president's forceful campaign approach -- including face-offs with reporters and criticisms of Obama -- may be just a preview.
COLUMBIA, S.C. — He's scrapping with reporters. Pushing his wife's candidacy. Lashing out at her top rival in the Democratic presidential race.
Former President Clinton's recent aggressive tactics in the 2008 campaign have propelled him squarely to center stage -- to the dismay of some prominent Democrats who fear he may be damaging the party's prospects for November.
The vocal role he is carving out also may be a preview, should Hillary Rodham Clinton win in the fall, of how the White House would operate under the unprecedented scenario of a president being married to an ex-president.
Bill Clinton is using both the megaphone he commands and his popularity among Democrats to try to help wrest a victory for his wife in Saturday's primary in South Carolina, a state where polls show she lags behind Barack Obama.
While touting his wife's credentials, the former president has tried to redefine Obama as a more calculating politician than voters might suspect. And he makes plain he is nursing grievances about how the campaign has unfolded.
Talking to a TV reporter in Charleston, S.C., the other day, Clinton accused the Obama campaign of orchestrating a "hit job" on him. He did not spell out what that meant. But the comment was the latest in a series of criticisms he has lobbed at the Illinois senator.
He clearly was peeved by Obama's comments about President Reagan. In a newspaper interview last week in Nevada, Obama opined that Reagan had changed the nation's "trajectory" more than Clinton or President Nixon had.
Taking exception
Clinton took that as an affront. "I thought we challenged the conventional wisdom in the '90s," Clinton told reporters at a restaurant here.
It's not clear that his approach is working. Increasingly, Democratic civic leaders and political figures are saying the sight of the former two-term president immersed in a partisan scrum leaves them unnerved.
House Majority Whip James E. Clyburn (D-S.C.), an influential African American, said he talked by telephone with Clinton on Wednesday night and warned that his behavior could scare off young, independent-minded voters that the party needed in the general election.
Clyburn said that in their 10-minute conversation, he heard no guarantees Clinton would stop.
"I told him I was concerned whether this nomination would be worth having if we don't put this behind us," said Clyburn, who has remained neutral in the primary race.
