Mr. Clinton has repeatedly described Mr. McCain, the Republican presidential nominee, as honest and trustworthy, though the Obama campaign has argued that Mr. McCain’s campaign rhetoric indicates otherwise. Mr. Clinton has missed few opportunities, while allowing that he disagrees politically with Mr. McCain, of Arizona, to say how much he likes the senator and to praise him for his support of Mr. Clinton’s efforts as president to normalize relations with Vietnam and intervene in Bosnia.
Mr. Clinton also went out of his way to praise Mr. McCain’s running mate, Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska. “I come from Arkansas,” he told reporters, “I get why she’s hot out there.”
As comfortable as Mr. Clinton is in saying, “I like John McCain,” and “I like Sarah Palin,” no one seems to have heard him say the same for Mr. Obama. Instead, when speaking of Mr. Obama, the Democratic nominee, Mr. Clinton has assumed a professorial stance that sometimes drifts toward emotional aloofness and disregard. |
