Balloon Shot Down Over DC

Apr 12, 2010 18 Comments ›› Pat Dollard

Hillary Clinton

Politico:

The trial balloon carrying Hillary Clinton to the Supreme Court floated over Washington for a few hours Monday morning, thrilling her admirers and hinting at a different kind of court nomination before the White House had punctured it by lunchtime with a sharp dismissal.

Utah Sen. Orrin Hatch, a senior Republican on the Judiciary Committee, gave the notion flight on NBC’ s “Today” show on Monday, mentioning that he’d heard her name and that she’d “be an interesting person in the mix.”

“I happen to like Hillary Clinton, I think she’s done a good job for the … secretary of state’s position, and I have high respect for her, and think a great deal of her,” he said.

Hatch wasn’t the only one to suggest it. POLITICO’s Allen floated the notion Saturday, and MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough suggested her this morning as well. But Hatch’s words — given his ability to play a role in a swift, easy confirmation — gave substance to the rumor, and thrilled even some of Clinton’s most senior supporters.

“She would be a great justice,” said mark Penn, Clinton’s longtime adviser and pollster. Clinton “would bring a revolution to the court and would be confirmable,” he said.

And State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley seemed not to dismiss it out of hand.

Clinton “loves her present job and is not looking for another one,” he said, adding, “but I’m sure she appreciates Sen. Hatch’s kind words.”

It’s also unclear whether Clinton would have wanted the job. She laughed off the idea when it was mentioned at one point during the 2008 presidential campaign, former aides said.

“She’s doing a great job as secretary of state. I talk to her regularly, and she’s very happy doing that job,” New York Sen. Chuck Schumer told POLITICO.

The notion has a certain logic: Clinton’s admirers have always seen her, as the historian Garry Wills wrote in 1992, as “one of the more important scholar-activists” of her day. She’d be easily confirmed by old Senate colleagues, the argument goes, and her skills in charming justices were honed in the Senate in 2001.

Even her mother, Dorothy Rodham, appears to have a special fondness for the idea, once telling a reporter in Arkansas that “she always thought her daughter would be the first woman to serve on the Supreme Court.”

”I was kind of sorry when Sandra Day O’Connor became the first,” Rodham said.

Not even Dorothy Rodham’s dreams, however, could deter White House spokesman Tommy Vietor, who e-mailed POLITICO soon after noon to put an end to a story that was rapidly captivating Democratic Washington.

“The President thinks Secretary Clinton is doing an excellent job as secretary of state and wants her to remain in that position,” he said.