In His Wife's Campaign, Bill Clinton Is a Free Agent

Campaign advisers are aware that they cannot deploy the former president as freely as Barack Obama's campaign might Michelle Obama, or as John Edwards's campaign might Elizabeth Edwards, because of Federal Election Commission rules regulating how his campaign appearances are paid for and because of the extra scrutiny he receives.

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At the same time, campaign officials do not want to squander his star power through overuse. One adviser compared it to using "conventional weapons versus a nuclear bomb -- when he goes places, it's a huge deal."

"We've never seen anything like this," said Skip Rutherford, a former director of the Clinton Presidential Library who is now dean of the Clinton School of Public Service at the University of Arkansas in Little Rock. "This is a completely new role and completely new ground in American politics."

Clinton has played an important pseudo-surrogate role at times. A week and a half ago, he headlined a closed fundraiser in Florida -- where his wife has pledged not to campaign after the state party moved its primary date up in violation of Democratic National Committee rules. (Under DNC rules, the candidate could have attended the fundraiser herself, but she chose to dispatch her husband.)

Still, Clinton is keeping his profile high in other ways that are only tangentially about his wife. Between a recent book tour and the annual Clinton Global Initiative summit in New York, he has amply promoted his own causes over the past two months.

When he appeared on "Oprah" in September -- an event that in political circles was seen as a way to undercut the talk show star's endorsement of Obama -- Clinton talked about how he should, as a former president, be addressed ("You can call me whatever you want"); whether he misses the White House ("yes and no"); his formerly bad eating habits ("potato chips, ham, I mean, potatoes, french fries, hamburgers"); and his book ("In the last chapter of my book, you know, I talk about how much people should give and why they do it").

But he mentioned his wife only in passing, to credit her with starting him jogging during law school and keeping him tied to the political world ("I'm still sort of in politics, 'cause Hillary is in politics," he said). Asked whether he is acting as a strategist for the campaign, Clinton demurred, saying he is, but "not in an organized way."

"Like, you know, if there's -- she's writing an important article or giving an important speech, she'll ask me to read it, particularly if it's something I know a lot about," Clinton said.

Last week at his library, in a speech at a Slate conference honoring top philanthropists, Clinton sounded almost critical of the presidential candidates, including his wife.

His complaint? None has put the subject of population control in a world with shrinking resources on the 2008 agenda.

"Now, nobody's going to talk about this in the election this year -- in either party -- but I ain't running for anything, I can do it," he said, saying the world population will be 9 billion by the year 2050.

He congratulated Al Gore for winning the Nobel Peace Prize, saying it was about time his vice president was recognized for his work on the environment. "He'd been ridiculed for it long enough, he deserved it," Clinton said.