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WASHINGTON – President-elect Barack Obama plans to nominate Hillary Rodham Clinton as secretary of state after Thanksgiving, a new milestone for the former first lady and a convergence of two political forces who fought hard for the presidency.

Today's New York Post Page Six gossip column offers readers the following prima facie risible item: Not So Secret HUMA Abedin, the traveling aide who is rarely out of Hillary Rodham Clinton's sight, has been seen with bachelor Rep. Anthony Weiner on the campaign trail. Shortly before Clinton arrived for a fund-raiser Thursday night at the Hiro club in the Meatpacking District, Abedin was spotted going into the Maritime Hotel around the corner with Weiner. If they were trying to keep their affair a secret, you'd think they'd find someplace where political reporters wouldn't be walking by. "If they were...

‘I Get a Little Wonky’ It was not a smart assumption, the senator says in an interview, for her or her staff to think voters knew the real Hillary Clinton from her Senate campaigns. By Jon Meacham NEWSWEEK Updated: 4:04 PM ET Jan 12, 2008 In a nondescript classroom on the grounds of the Electrical Training Institute of IBEW Local 11, amid the stuff of a campaign-event holding room—bottles of water, tea, a Sharpie laid out next to a few placards and photos that need autographing for local supporters—Hillary Clinton sat down with NEWSWEEK's Jon Meacham for an interview that...

The stunning political earthquake in New Hampshire on Tuesday and its aftershocks are opening a wrenching fissure in Democratic politics -- raising the prospect of a bitter campaign with racial and gender undertones that could damage Democratic presidential hopes in November by alienating an important voting bloc -- African Americans or women. Though the respective celebrations over Barack Obama's Iowa win and the resurrection of Hillary Clinton's campaign at first obscured signs of trouble, it has become apparent that together they inflicted wounds that may be difficult to heal. In the days leading up to Tuesday's voting, the Clinton camp...

An off-the-cuff comment Hillary Clinton made in Las Vegas on Thursday has ignited a national firestorm. Answering a shout from a man in the crowd who said, "I'm married to an illegal woman," Clinton shot back, "No woman is illegal," grinning as the packed Mexican restaurant at which she was speaking exploded in cheers. That comment, reported in Friday's Review-Journal, caught the attention of the likes of Rush Limbaugh, Lou Dobbs and the Drudge Report and led to nearly 1,000 angry comments on the newspaper's Web site. To put the remark into context, Clinton did add, after a pause, "......

DES MOINES, Iowa - Hillary Rodham Clinton delivered a campaign sermon Sunday, but didn't stick around to hear the pastor do his preaching. "We're still at church. We're still going to worship no matter what," the Rev. Lee Maxey said as the Democratic presidential candidate, her daughter, Chelsea, and their entourage left Corinthian Baptist Church, the media pack close behind. Clinton stayed for about 20 minutes and, when she spoke, noted her support for children's rights. The New York senator also highlighted a chapter in her book, "It Takes a Village," that talks about every child needing a champion. She...

Is Sen. Hillary Clinton feeling any doubts about winning the Democratic nomination for president? Not at all. "It will be me," Clinton tells Katie Couric in an interview to air Monday on the "CBS Evening News With Katie Couric." The broadcast airs at 6:30 p.m. on WKMG-Channel 6. Couric also asked if Clinton is concerned that Oprah Winfrey could boost Sen. Barack Obama by campaigning for him in three key states. "No, at the end of the day," Clinton says. "I'm proud to have my husband support me ... with his knowledge, experience and incredible ability to vouch for me."

June 11, 1996 in History Event: Bob Dole, Sen-R-KS, resigns from U.S. senate to run for president

WASHINGTON -- Democrats face a potentially disastrous conundrum in the 2008 presidential nominating race: Sen. Hillary Clinton, the front-runner, is the most disliked candidate among her party's contenders. Despite the strong lead she holds over her closest rivals, the New York senator draws the general electorate's highest negative ratings of anyone in the race, Republican or Democrat, when pollsters ask the voters if they have a favorable or unfavorable opinion of each candidate. A Gallup survey conducted from Aug. 3 to Aug. 5 found that 49 percent of the 1,012 Americans they polled said they had an unfavorable opinion of...

It had been billed as "a milestone in presidential campaign history", a chance for the anarchists of cyberspace to pitch the kind of questions at White House candidates that no mainstream journalist would dare to ask.While executives from the CNN television network and its partner YouTube, the video-sharing website, were trumpeting last night's debate between Democratic candidates as revolutionary, the reaction from bloggers and new-media commentators has been decidedly lukewarm.Although the 2,989 questions submitted by video ranged from the weirdly off-beat to the outright cheeky, the aspiring participants in the debate held in Charleston, South Carolina, condemned plans by CNN...

When will these candidates learn to turn or take off their microphones. At the end of an NAACP Presidential Forum in Detroit in which fringe candidates Mike Gravel and Dennis Kucinich repeatedly upstaged the top two tiers, John Edwards approached Hillary Clinton at her podium and, perhaps forgetting that microphones were still on, can clearly be heard saying "we should think about at some point... maybe some time in the fall, we'll try to have a more serious debate with a smaller group of people." Hillary agreed with Edwards, saying "We've got to cut the numbers of these, because they...

Obama strategist David Plouffe released a memo last week arguing that Hillary Clinton's advantages were essentially those of incumbency, that her support was thin, and that Obama should actually be considered the front-runner. Mark Penn, Clinton's chief strategist, responded today with a memo that seemed designed to bludgeon all opposition into senselessness through the sheer power of numbers (links to 40 polls showing Hillary in the lead!) Penn strongly implies another i-word is the best description of Hillary -- not "incumbent," but "inevitable." In recent election cycles, any time a candidate has had as much as 35 or 40 percent...

Oh, man. Does she EVER stop yelling? Should we ax *Bubba? Hillary cherishes the rule of law.

Two days after a major immigration overhaul died in the Senate, Democratic presidential candidates vowed if elected to push through lesgislation that would protect workers and give unlawful immigrants a path to citizenship...

Hillary Rodham Clinton said Saturday she is “appalled” by remarks made by Republican Fred Thompson suggesting that some Cuban refugees could be terrorists. Thompson, an actor and former Tennessee senator, spoke about Cuban refugees Wednesday during an appearance in South Carolina. The topic was illegal immigration and Thompson’s opposition to any legislation that does not do enough to protect America’s borders. Using Cuban refugees as an example, Thompson said, “I don’t imagine they’re coming here to bring greetings from Castro. We’re living in the era of the suitcase bomb,” Clinton, New York’s junior Democratic senator, speaking to a group of...

"Democratic presidential hopeful Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., is greeted by Arkansas supporters at the Democratic Party of Arkansas Jefferson-Jackson Day event in North Little Rock, Ark."

Memo to Hillary Rodham Clinton: Your deputy campaign manager was right. An internal campaign memo late last month urged the Democratic front-runner to bypass first-up and momentum-generating Iowa because of Clinton's lackluster showing despite drawing large crowds - a memo she immediately disavowed. Yet, the reality from Des Moines to Dubuque lends credence to deputy campaign manager Mike Henry's assessment that for Clinton, Iowa is "our consistently weakest state." Presidential rival John Edwards has capitalized on the remnants of his 2004 presidential operation in the state, the freedom to visit in the absence of a day job and a fresh...

'The pen blew up all over her hands.'

Like many conservatives, I’ve been a frequent consumer of Hillariana over the years. I fondly recall the chapters of The Hillary Trap: Looking for Power in all the Wrong Places, Hell to Pay: The Unfolding Story of Hillary Rodham Clinton, Madame Hillary: The Dark Road to the White House, and Rewriting History. So, with a mix of stimulation and fatigue, I opened Bay Buchanan’s newly released The Extreme Makeover of Hillary (Rodham) Clinton. Undeniably, there are few more topical persons than the junior Senator from New York, but, as works concerning her continue to roll forth, the crucial question regarding...

"Democratic presidential hopeful Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., gets an enthusiastic greeting in Greenville, S.C., Friday, April 27, 2007, as she arrives at the Allen Temple A.M.E. Church and Community Development Center to hold a town hall-style campaign stop."

(He says he wants to clean up politics; GOP activists say he's muzzling speech) Washington, D.C. - Republican John McCain has a unique obstacle to overcome as he seeks his party's presidential nomination. His signature achievement in the U.S. Senate - the 2002 McCain-Feingold campaign finance law - is reviled by many of the GOP's most vocal activists and powerful interest groups."You have the key constituencies of the Republican Party, or the conservative wing of the Republican Party, who consider John McCain to be Public Enemy Number One," said Cleta Mitchell, a lawyer with Foley & Lardner who has battled...

It’s now obvious that Hillary Clinton’s negatives are rising among American voters. A Harris Interactive survey says that a majority will not vote for her, and a Gallup poll this week finds her favorability among Democratic primary voters dropping from 82 percent in January, to 74 percent in March.

Polls show Clinton in lead, especially among women By Stewart M. Powell, Hearst Newspapers Washington | Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., the leading contender for the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination, holds a 20-point advantage over Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., among Democratic women, according to a Gallup Poll released Friday. The nationwide telephone survey of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents showed Clinton enjoying even wider advantages among Democratic women over former Vice President Al Gore and former Sen. John Edwards, D-N.C. The survey underscored Clinton's continued strength among women voters and the challenge she faces trying to win comparable support among men...

The growing consensus seems to be that the former first lady's ascendancy as first woman president of the United States is less assured than previously thought, thanks in large part to the junior senator from Illinois, Barack Obama... Hillary has a bigger problem than Obama. Anyone who has heard her speak knows what it is, so we may as well talk about it. That voice. Every time Hillary opens her mouth, Americans are reminded ...: (1) she's not Bill, and (2) she's as tone-deaf... In Selma, Ala., last weekend at the "Bloody Sunday" commemoration, Hillary auditioned for a dual role...

Cary Clack: Say it! Give Hillary Clinton a little slack Express-News In the late 1970s, when R&B listeners heard the music of Teena Marie, they assumed it was the debut of another young and sensational black female singer. The same thing happened a few years ago when people heard British teenager Joss Stone. So naturally soulful were their voices that many were surprised to learn that both Lady T and Stone are white. No one, upon hearing a speech by Sen. Hillary Clinton and not knowing who she is would ever assume that she was black or from the South,...

After viewing a tape of Hillary Clinton’s speech to a black church in Selma, Alabama, there is no doubt that the Illinois native and New York Senator tried to fake a “Southern” accent in a ploy to connect to her audience. Like her husband, Hillary Clinton is about as phony as they come. She will do almost anything to get elected President of the United States, so faking an accent is no big deal. How does this register with voters, especially black voters who understand the tactics being used by not only Hillary, but also Obama, who likewise employed a...

The growing consensus seems to be that the former first lady’s ascendancy as first woman president of the U.S. is less assured than previously thought, thanks in large part to ... Barack Obama. The naked truth is, Hillary has a bigger problem than Obama. Anyone who has heard her speak knows what it is, so we may as well talk about it. That voice. Every time Hillary opens her mouth, Americans are reminded of two things: (1) she’s not Bill, and (2) she’s as tone-deaf in the presence of human beings as she was singing "The Star-Spangled Banner" in Iowa....

Cheers to the Truth! "Where is the G-damn f**king flag? I want the G-damn f**king flag up every f**king morning at f**king sunrise." (From the book "Inside The White House" by Ronald Kessler, p. 244 - Hillary to the staff at the Arkansas Governor's mansion on Labor Day, 1991) "You sold out, you mother f**ker! You sold out!" From the book "Inside" by Joseph Califano, p. 213 - Hillary yelling at Democrat lawyer. "It's been said, and I think it's accurate, that my husband was obsessed by terrorism in general and al-qaida in particular." (Hillary telling a post-9/11 world what...

By Greg Reeson February 23, 2007 Despite voting to authorize the use of force against Iraq in 2002, Senator and would-be-President Hillary Clinton is now calling for a 90-day deadline to start the redeployment of American troops from what is erroneously called a Sunni -- Shiite civil war. Since Mrs. Clinton steadfastly refuses to apologize for her Iraq war vote, one has to wonder just what caused this sudden change of heart? The truth is that it's really quite simple. Democrats, particularly those trying to win the White House, are running out of time to effect a course change in...

Democratic political strategist James Carville is revisiting the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth’s attack on John Kerry in 2004 to scare up financial support for Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign. In a mass e-mail sent out under the "Hillary for President” banner, Carville offers a quote from the StopHillaryPAC: "Those Swift Boat Veterans for Truth were the real heroes of the 2004 election. We at the StopHillaryPAC want to do the same thing to Hillary.” Carville writes: "You read that right. There are people who think the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth are heroes for what they did in 2004 –...

ALBANY (AP) - Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's unfavorable rating among state voters has climbed by a third since her landslide re-election victory in November, a statewide poll reported Wednesday. While the Democrat's favorable rating among state voters remained at 56 percent in the latest poll from Siena College's Research Institute, her unfavorable rating was at 40 percent, the highest in the last two years of Siena's polling. Immediately after her re-election victory over former Yonkers Mayor John Spencer, her unfavorable rating was 29 percent. Siena poll spokesman Steven Greenberg said the rise in Clinton's unfavorable rating likely stemmed from her...

Participating in the forum today in Carson City, Nev., are, from left: former Senator Mike Gravel; Senator Harry Reid; former Governor Tom Vilsack; Senator Joe Biden; Representative Dennis J. Kucinich ; Senator Christopher J. Dodd; former Senator John Edwards; Gerald McEntee, the head of the public employees union sponsoring the event; and Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton. By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Published: February 21, 2007

CARSON CITY, Nev. - Here's a good bet. If Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton decides to do some gambling in Nevada, check out the blackjack table. "I'm not much of a gambler, but I have gambled," the New York senator said in a brief interview with The Associated Press on Wednesday, adding that her favorite game probably is blackjack. Clinton was in Nevada, one of the early voting states, to participate in a candidate forum. Democrats recently circulated a 44-page document repackaging Las Vegas and Nevada, considered the wild child of American culture, as utterly ordinary. Heartland over a...

<p>February 21, 2007 -- MIAMI - Hillary Rodham Clinton vowed yesterday to change the United States so it's no longer an "arrogant power" that alienates the world.</p> <p>"When I'm president, I'm going to send a message to the world that America is back - we're not the arrogant power that we've been acting like for the last six years," Sen. Clinton said during her first campaign stop in the Sunshine State.</p>

As Senator Clinton prepares to face off with many of her Democratic rivals today, she aligned herself directly with President Bush on the issue of immigration, using a campaign stop in South Florida to highlight a rare point of agreement with an administration that she criticizes at every turn. Speaking to about 300 community leaders in an area with a large immigrant population, Mrs. Clinton staked out a centrist position on the hot-button topic, saying she supported a "pathway to legalization" for the nation's 11 million to 12 million estimated undocumented immigrants, but only if they waited in line and...

Clinton Objects to Confederate Flag Feb 19 4:25 PM US/Eastern By JIM DAVENPORT Associated Press Writer ORANGEBURG, S.C. (AP) -- Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton said Monday that South Carolina should remove the Confederate flag from its Statehouse grounds, in part because the nation should unite under one banner while at war. "I think about how many South Carolinians have served in our military and who are serving today under our flag and I believe that we should have one flag that we all pay honor to, as I know that most people in South Carolina do every single...

One of the most important decisions that Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., made about her bid for the presidency came late last year, when she ended a debate in her camp over whether she should repudiate her 2002 vote authorizing military action in Iraq. Several advisers, friends and donors said in interviews that they had urged her to call her vote a mistake to appease anti-war Democrats, who play a critical role in the nominating process. Yet Clinton herself, backed by another faction, never wanted to apologize -- even if she viewed the war as a mistake -- arguing that...

Sunday, Aug. 7, 2005 1:43 p.m. EDT Candy Crowley: Hillary Seen as 'Goddess' 2008 presidential candidate Hillary Clinton is considered a "goddess" in Democratic Party circles, CNN's Candy Crowley reported Saturday. "I honestly hear the word 'goddess' attached to her," Crowley told fellow CNN'er Joe Johns, who asked her to survey the 2008 political landscape. "She's kind of this – she doesn't have to show up in New Hampshire for another three-and-a-half years, because she's such a presence there," Crowley continued to gush. In the next breath Crowley seemed at a loss for words to explain the awe-inspiring power of...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, the early front-runner for the Democratic presidential nomination, has called for a 90-day deadline to start pulling American troops from Iraq. Clinton, the wife of former President Bill Clinton, has been criticized by some Democrats for supporting authorization of the war in 2002 and for not renouncing her vote as she seeks the U.S. presidency in next year's election. "Now it's time to say the redeployment should start in 90 days or the Congress will revoke authorization for this war," the New York senator said in a video on her campaign Web...

Democratic Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton said Friday that her unsuccessful health care reform effort in 1993 makes her more effective on the issue now as she seeks the presidencyThis week, rival John Edwards offered his plan for universal health care that calls for a tax increase to ensure health care coverage for all and a requirement that businesses provide insurance. The tax increase would pay for the plan's cost of up to $120 billion a year."The president can propose, but the Congress has to dispose, and if we don't have a consensus in the country that our present system is...

U.S. Senator Hillary Clinton (D-NY) speaks during a news conference at Bellevue Hospital New York February 6, 2007. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid (UNITED STATES)

Pumping her fists and shouting to the rooftops, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton vowed yesterday to bring an immediate end to the war in Iraq if she's elected president. "If we in Congress don't end this war before January 2009, as president, I will," Clinton pledged in a speech to the Democratic faithful as she staked out a new position on the conflict. While she has been escalating her criticism of the war for months, yesterday was the first time Clinton spoke about what she would do about it if she wins the White House in 2008. The former first lady's...

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT RUSH: Let's go to the audiotape. Mrs. Clinton. This is last Saturday at Des Moines' East High School. She said this about her position on the war in Iraq. HILLARY: I said that we should not go to war unless we have allies. So he took the authority that I and others gave him and he misused it, and I regret that deeply. And if we had known then what we know now, there never would have been a vote and I never would have voted to give this president that authority. RUSH: Yay! This is an outright...

I was listening to the Sean Hannity show today and he said that Hillary Clinton, in an effort to show us her "softer" side, said she likes to "organize her closet". This raises some interesting questions.Question 1: Would this be the same closet where she found those Whitewater billing records? And if so, how good could she possibly be at this "organizing" thing?Question 2: Don't you have to have a special permit or something to handle so many skeletons?Question 3: How long before Bill ends up in there?

Sen. Hillary Clinton has spoken up in support of her husband Bill’s defense of his anti-terror efforts, saying she’s tired of Democrats being pushed around on national security issues. "I just think that my husband did a great job in demonstrating that Democrats are not going to take this,” she said on Monday in remarks reported by Newsday. In a heated discussion with Chris Wallace on "Fox News Sunday,” Bill Clinton said that as president, he did more than many of his conservative critics to pursue al-Qaida, and alleged that President Bush didn’t try to stop terrorism in the eight...

I am at a loss for words

SOURCES: TIME turns this week's cover into a ballot on Hillary Clinton, inviting readers to vote whether they 'love her' or 'hate her.' Readers can check their preference on the cover and mail it in...

As of March 31, Hillary Rodham Clinton's Senate re-election committee had 36 people on its payroll and $19.7 million in the bank, although Republicans still haven't decided which of two relatively unknown candidates to run against her. By contrast, Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania a top Senate Republican trailing in the polls in his bid for re-election had 23 salaried staffers and a mere $9 million on hand, federal records show. Clinton's re-election efforts are dwarfing her colleagues' campaigns and prompting speculation that she already is gearing up for a presidential bid in 2008. "It's hard to say she's not running...