Private citizen Hillary has nothing better to do than respond to pressures from the Left and the Right

AP photo courtesy of Real Clear Politics.

Reading about the pressure for Hillary Clinton to run in 2016, I’m thinking she and I have something in common. A recurring annoyance from being self-employed and working from home is that others often assume I have nothing to do. Never mind that I’m working on a book-length memoir, maintain a blog, and complete freelance writing assignments periodically. 

Obviously, simply managing my life takes time with bills to pay, chores to do, and maintaining ties with friends and family.

And here we have Hillary Clinton seeking some downtime after years of public service to enjoy being a private citizen for awhile. In the meantime, she’s writing a book, making paid speeches, and contributing time and energy to the Clinton Global Initiative – the family foundation.

Are all those pressuring Hillary to run for president in 2016 oblivious to the fact that she has other things to do at the moment?

Plus, there are the Republicans and a few pseudo progressives at the Huffington Post doing their best to destroy her potential candidacy before she even has time to take a deep breath and compose an announcement.

I deal with pressure in my own life by practicing mindfulness meditation and for all I know, Hillary does the same. If not, I’m wishing she would explore this wonderful means for maintaining sanity in the midst of life’s many conflicting demands. 

Here's a thought: Wouldn't it be wonderful if our next president practiced mindfulness meditation?

The AP's Ken Thomas explores Hillary’s efforts to seek the right balance:

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Hillary Rodham Clinton is trying to strike the right balance between staying out of the daily political maelstrom and setting herself up for a possible second presidential run. But her fans and foes are making that difficult.

Nearly six months after departing the State Department, Clinton finds herself in the middle of an early effort by both parties to prepare for her return to politics even as she keeps to a schedule of highly paid private speeches, work on her book and her family's global foundation.

Clinton has not said whether she'll seek the White House in 2016 but grassroots activists are already at work on a super political action committee called Ready for Hillary, which has rallied local supporters, started a fundraising campaign and rolled out prominent endorsements.

Republicans, meanwhile, vow to dissect her work during the Obama administration - including last year's deadly assault on the U.S. diplomatic mission in Benghazi - and use the former first lady as a fundraising tool.

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Larry King’s Interview with the Smart, Savvy, Dignified Former President Bill Clinton

The transcript of Larry King’s interview with Bill Clinton posted at CNN is in sharp contrast to the media’s disgraceful treatment of him during the Democratic primary and general election. Week after week, the punditry presented the most egregious caricatures of Clinton their limited abilities could produce. Of course, they had to do their level best to support the DNC in its attempts to destroy both Hillary and Bill – for example, resorting to outright lies in their efforts to smear them as racists - in order to assure that Obama, the least qualified candidate, would be swept into the presidency.

King’s interview presents the former president as he is: the smart, dignified international leader whose global initiative continues to confront the world’s most pressing problems.

The following transcript has been edited for brevity and clarity:

Larry King: The stimulus bill passed today [Tuesday]. The president signed it in Denver. Is it going to work?

Bill Clinton: I think it will do what it's designed to do. And I think it's important that the American people understand what it's designed to do.

It's supposed to do three things.

Number one, put money in people's pockets who are in trouble now -- extended unemployment benefits, the modest tax cuts, increase in food stamps. That will help grocery stores and other businesses and keep Americans who are good, honest, hardworking people afloat. Watch Larry King's interview with Bill Clinton »

The second thing it's supposed to do is give a chunk of money to state and local governments, primarily for education and health. That is designed to make sure that they don't have to either have big tax increases or lay a million people off. Either one, in this economy, would be bad.

The third thing it will do is to create jobs through existing road and bridge contracts, through rail improvements, through modernization and especially through clean energy and energy efficiency.

So I think that given how fast it had to be done and the compromises that had to be made, it's quite a good bill. And I think it will do what it's designed to do.

King: John McCain and others on the other side of the ledger are saying that he didn't come forward enough to the Republicans, he didn't make them part of this Easter basket.

Clinton: Well, I disagree with that. I think the only way he could have gotten a lot of them to vote for him would be to accept their economic theory. Their economic theory is why we're in this mess in the first place.

King: Do you resent it when the Bush people say that this problem started with you, it started in your administration?

Clinton: Well, they don't have much evidence for that. I always answer, does anyone seriously believe if the team I had in place had been in place for the last eight years that this would have happened? And the answer to that is no. We had a much more vigorous regulatory environment with the Securities and Exchange Commission. We were watching these derivatives. I do think we should have done more on derivatives.

King: Before we move on to other things, should taxpayers be bailing out the automakers?

Clinton: We don't owe it to them. We should only do it if it's in our interests. I believe it's in our interests ...

King: We keep hearing about Obama's BlackBerry -- he's got a special BlackBerry now that doesn't have to be recorded into the White House. Do you have the number?

Clinton: No. No.

King: Would you like the number?

Clinton: I know that in the world that exists today, if you're hyper-busy, you need them. Hillary lives on hers.

King: Do you have one?

Clinton: I don't. I like being able to concentrate on what I'm doing one thing at a time, you know. And I think if I had one, I'm so hyper and always trying to do three things at once, I'd be worse than he is or worse than she is. So I don't have one.

King: What's Chelsea going to be? Is she interested in government?

Clinton: Yes, she's interested in government. She cares about public health. She thinks that America has still got a ways to go to develop an affordable, high quality health care system. And I think she wants to be a part of it.

King: Sarah Palin, net plus, net gain?

Clinton: I think she was a net plus before the failure of Lehman Brothers and the collapse of the stock market, because she gave (McCain) credibility on the Republican right. Through no fault of her own, she became a negative on September 15th, because nobody on their team had any economic experience, and the burden against the Republicans was overwhelming.

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