Hillary Clinton for Vice President in 2012? Biden 'Trade Talk' Murmur Could Swell

Washington's chattering class, never timid about giving advice to the president of the United States, is floating the idea of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton becoming Barack Obama's running mate in two years.

Time magazine, in an item Wednesday on its website, said Obama perhaps should consider the proposition -- "dump Biden" would be part of it -- as he begins planning for his reelection bid in 2012. "Amid two wars, a stubborn unemployment rate, an oil spill . . . might the White House need a little star power to jump-start what could be a tougher reelection than expected?" writes contributor Dan Fastenberg. "As secretary of state, Hillary Clinton has been striking the same tone as Team No Drama Obama, as opposed to the human gaffe machine." Hmm, would that be Vice President Joe Biden and his big bleeping deal health care law?

The latest round of I-don't-have-anything-better-to-do-today speculation began earlier this month when former Virginia Gov. Doug Wilder wrote in a Politico op-ed piece that Obama should replace Biden with Clinton, in part because she would help win back "middle-class independent voters," who have drifted away from the president. Working-class voters, says Wilder, have always been "more enamored of Clinton." The former governor, who is African American, didn't say it, but "working class" in this context could be code for white voters, a group Hillary ran stronger among than did Obama when they opposed each other -- sometimes bitterly -- in the 2008 primary campaign. Wilder goes on to make a case against Biden, saying his verbal blunders are not only fodder for late-night comedians but have undermined "what little confidence the public may have in him."

In a piece for the Washington Post website in June, Sally Quinn wrote that Clinton and Biden, former chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, should switch jobs. "Really," she says. Really? Her argument is that Clinton has done "an incredible job" at State and, even in her late 60s, would be a strong candidate for president in 2016, while Biden, who is older, has no intention of seeking the White House. In the short-term, Obama and Clinton would be a "near-unbeatable team" in 2012, according to Quinn.

A month earlier Politics Daily's Eleanor Clift beat everyone to the punch by suggesting the same thing. She wrote that "Obama's loyalty only goes so far," and if polls show an Obama-Clinton ticket would run stronger in 2012, he "might well have Biden step aside." Besides, Clift argued, Biden "would be a natural at the State Department."

But insofar as a 2016 presidential candidacy is concerned, Hillary Clinton has already said her White House aspirations are history. And does it matter that she can arguably offer more service to the American people as secretary of state than as vice president, a job FDR vice president John Nance Garner described as "not worth a bucket of warm spit." (Actually, the salty Gardner reportedly used a stronger term than spit). Biden, for his part, has emerged as a valuable foreign policy adviser to Obama, a roving ambassador, vigorous partisan campaigner and all-around good guy. Does he talk too much? Sometimes. But that would be just as true at Foggy Bottom as it is in the vice president's office.

It's been more than three decades since a president has thrown his vice president overboard. A change at the top can be seen as a sign of disarray, panic even. Dan Quayle, regarded by his critics as a lightweight, survived in 1992 but the Bush-Quayle ticket lost to Clinton-Gore. The last president to make a change was Republican Gerald Ford, who replaced Vice President Nelson Rockefeller with Sen. Bob Dole in 1976 and went on to lose to a peanut farmer from Georgia named Jimmy Carter.

Barack Obama considered Hillary Clinton for vice president in 2008. Ultimately, he decided she was a better fit at the State Department. Good call.