Anyone who knows anything about the political success Bill and Hillary Clinton have enjoyed knows that Terry McAuliffe was the indispensable campaign fundraiser who made it all possible.
As it happens, I know a little more than most about their relationship – having worked down the hall from Terry when he was serving as chief fundraiser for the Clinton-Gore re-election campaign in 1996. (I was just a foot soldier who served as the national procurement coordinator for the campaign.)
But suffice it to know that Terry was as much a personal friend of the Clintons as he was their fundraiser. Therefore, Bill and Hillary were probably motivated as much by friendship as by indebtedness when they threw their considerable clout behind Terry’s bid to win the Democratic nomination for governor of Virginia.
(“McAuliffe, the Clinton’s Moneyman Suffers Humiliating Political Defeat,” The iPINIONS Journal, June 10, 2009)
That was four years ago, when he didn’t even win the Democratic primary, let alone the governorship.
So here’s to Terry for heeding that old proverb: if at first you don’t succeed, try, try again. Because Virginia voters (including yours truly) elected him governor yesterday over his archconservative, Tea-Party Republican opponent in a race that, frankly, ended up being far too close for comfort: 48 to 45 percent.
Nobody knows better than Terry, however, that the only significance his victory holds for the national/international media is the extent to which the Clintons will be able to use his governorship of our swing state of Virginia as a stepping stone into the White House in 2016. In other words, they stumped for his campaign this time not to pay debts to Terry, but to collect IOUs.
And, trust me, he will be all too happy to oblige….
Congratulations, Governor-Elect McAuliffe!
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