An anecdote in Hillary Clinton's memoir "Hard Choices" about former vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin is getting some pushback from Obama campaign veterans,
Politico reported.
Just hours after the book was released, some of President Barack Obama's campaign staffers objected to a claim she made saying their team wanted to attack Palin for being a woman, according to the political news website.
"That’s not what happened," said one campaign veteran, who wished to remain anonymous, according to Politico. "The Palin thing was an odd way to put it. The question that was raised with numerous Democratic leaders was whether Gov. Palin had the right experience to be a heartbeat away from the presidency, and it’s the same question that would have been raised regardless of gender."
Clinton she has been striking a balance during her nationwide book tour, seen as many as a prelude to a possible presidential run, insisting she was never disappointed with Obama but that she did disagree with him sometimes.
"You’re not going to agree — I don’t care who you are — with everything any president does," Clinton told
CNN's Christiane Amanpour this week.
Obama and Clinton and their aides are stressing the personal closeness between the president and his one-time political rival.
"We have been able to have a no-surprises culture, and that is rooted in the fact that we have very deep personal relationships," said Ben Rhodes, Obama’s deputy national security adviser, according to Politico. "She is going to do what she is going to do and she is going to say what she is going to say, but generally the lines of communication are such that there are no surprises on the big issues that come up."
In her book, Clinton says she formed an "unexpected partnership" with Obama while working for him. The two maintain they are friends and meet for lunch occasionally and talk "with some regularity."
She also hired Tommy Vietor, a former National Security Council spokesman, to help with her book's publicity. Vietor worked with Clinton during her time at State but is an Obama loyalist.
"Obviously the ‘07-‘08 primary was hard fought and there were deeply felt beliefs on each side about which candidate should win and, at the time, hard feelings that ended very quickly after the primary did, especially for the two of them," Vietor told Politico.
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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