Eying ’08

Oh, come on. Everyone knows Hillary is going to run in ’08. It’s inevitable. She is busy putting together her crack team (ostensibly for her ’06 Senate Run), which includes Neera Tanden of NY. From the Hindustan Times:

Senator Hillary Clinton has chosen an Indian American and several other long-time advisers as part of her inner team to gear up for her 2006 re-election bid.

Neera Tanden, who joined the Democrat from New York last year as her legislative director, worked in former President Bill Clinton’s White House and with Hillary Clinton in various capacities for many years.

…Tanden, who was born and brought up in the US, is a law graduate. She worked as Associate Director of the White House Domestic Policy Council during President Bill Clinton’s tenure. She focused on healthcare, education and juvenile crime for then first lady Hillary Clinton. Even before that, she worked on the Clinton-Al Gore campaign in California in 1992 and 1996.

A graduate of the University of California, Los Angeles, and Yale Law School, Tanden was on Hillary Clinton’s campaign as deputy campaign manager in her run for Congress in 2001.

So what kind of team is Clinton putting together?

Roll Call magazine called Clinton’s team “a small, ethnically diverse stable of advisers dominated by women,” which is supposed to help “chart her political course over the next four years.”

9 thoughts on “Eying ’08

  1. I have to admit, the Desi-Pride part of me thought this was cool and wanted to know more about Neera Tanden, until I read this part –

    She focused on healthcare, education and juvenile crime for then first lady Hillary Clinton.

    I’m sorry but HillaryCare was possibly the single worst idea to come out of the Clinton administration. It’s truly unfortunate if Neera was wrapped up in this.

  2. “Oh, come on. Everyone knows Hillary is going to run in Γ‚β€˜08. ItÂ’s inevitable.”

    Are you kidding me? Perhaps you’ve been a lil busy focusing on South Asian related news to have followed the recent election. Hillary is still popular in NYC/NYS tho’ not so much in the vaunted red states. And she lacks the folkiness charm of her caddish husband which allowed him to bypass the American anti-intellectual sentiment. And she’s prescient enuff to realize this. There’s no way she could win the national ticket even if she won the Democratic nomination.

    I found it annoying that the bobblehead pundits were speculating about 2008 even before the 2004 elction was underway. It’s politics as sports, totally disengaged from policies and people. Not to mention naive to think you can be able to predict the outcome of a future event when you can’t even accurately predict the conditions that will eventually lead to said future event.

  3. It’s rumored that Bill Clinton, Oprah or Bobby Jindal might be her running mate. Talk about ethnic diversity! Oprah’s got my vote.

  4. “Are you kidding me? Perhaps you’ve been a lil busy focusing on South Asian related news to have followed the recent election.”

    Ummm. I am willing to bet my left one that she runs in ’08. I didn’t say that she’d WIN. I said she’d run. I hope you understand the difference between the two terms.

    And just to clarify, I don’t only focus on South-Asian related news. Thats only what I blog about on this site.

  5. i invited neera to speak to my interns in 2002…she was very pregnant, very busy and one of the best speakers i had that summer. she’s a phenomenal human…i hope she isn’t written off w/a “hillarycare” label. πŸ™‚

  6. bobblehead pundits Hey! That’s my line…but I’m willing to share πŸ™‚

    Anna, I’m sure that Neera by association with Hillary will be somehow smeared — ethnically, ideologically or politically..only a matter of time.

  7. Sluggo / LiberalPundit – just to be clear, i was impressed by Hillary’s appointment of a high ranking Desi. However, I’m disappointed IF Neera was wrapped up in the Hillarycare debacle.

    In other words – oh the horror! – I disagree with her policies. If you consider that a smear, so be it – in my book it’s rather apropos to dislike a policy advisor for her, uh, policy advice.

  8. If you looked at her resume, you would see that Neera didn’t graduate law school until ’96. She had no association with HillaryCare