"According to a Quinnipiac poll of New Yorkers, Clinton's approval rating has steadily risen from 38 percent on Feb. 14, 2001 to 61 percent on Sept. 14, 2004. "She's not the caricature that people thought," Carroll said. "She's not a '60s lefty. She's not a loony leftist, and she works. She's a reasonably centrist liberal." Carroll said Democrats who aspire to their party's nomination in 2008 would "either have to beat her or discourage her" from running."