American nightmare

 Washington, DC

As if American politics were not scary enough, the prospect of President Hillary Rodham Clinton has once again reared its frightful head. The woman is a proven horror, politically speaking. One senior Democrat strategist calls her the ‘kiss of death’. She loses elections she ought to win because people don’t like her.

Just over a week away from the midterm elections, Democrat candidates in various states are said to be relieved that she isn’t conducting one of her vanity tours of the country. She has even fallen foul of the #MeToo movement, after she dared to say her husband, Bill, had not abused his power over Monica Lewinsky. Still, like death, Hillary never goes away. Last week, one of her most trusted advisers, Philippe Reines, hinted that she may run in the next presidential election. ‘It’s curious why Hillary Clinton’s name isn’t in the mix — either conversationally or in formal polling — as a 2020 candidate,’ he said. ‘Is it a lack of support? She had 65 million people vote for her.’ Wiser heads may shake, but Clinton 2020 has a certain grim logic. If not her, who? In two years, Bernie Sanders, torchbearer of left-populism, will be 79. Joe Biden, Barack Obama’s vice-president, will be 77. Both have tried and failed before. Elizabeth Warren has for years been presented as the woman who could unite the left, but she has turned herself into a national joke with her insistence that she is Native American when she isn’t, at least not really. Trump calls her Pocahontas, which is funny. The younger Democrat stars — Kamala Harris, Cory ‘Spartacus’ Booker, Amy Klobuchar, Kirsten Gillibrand — lack clout. There is a lot of hype around Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the pretty Hispanic congressional candidate from the Bronx, but she isn’t the brightest. Last week, she said that humanity must fight climate change like it fought the Nazis, which is sweet, but stupid.