President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton gave a joint interview on 60 Minutes last night, exchanging praise and reflecting on the last five years.
It’s been quite a ride since 2007.
She was his chief rival for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2008, but on Sunday, the outgoing Secretary of State served as Obama’s chief cheerleader.
The feeling was very much mutual.
The two smiled, bantered and laughed like old friends throughout interview, Barack’s first as president with a person other than Michelle Obama.
It was a performance by a pair of all-pro Democratic politicians whose lives and legacies are forever entwined. The takeaway, at least as they see it:
This all worked out, don’t you agree?
The praise Obama used to describe his chief diplomat will serve as icing on the cake for Clinton, at least for those already inclined to hold her in high regard.
“I just wanted to publicly have a chance to say thank you,” Obama said when asked by Steve Kroft, the interviewer, why he wanted to appear with Clinton.
“I think Hillary will go down as one of the finest secretaries of state we’ve ever had.”
Clinton called her relationship with Obama “warm, close” and said they share “a sense of understanding that sometimes doesn’t take words.”
Obama said that a rough 2008 election has helped forge a “strong” friendship between them and that the acrimony of those primary battles evaporated quickly.
But they also acknowledged that the bitterness of a nasty campaign lingered among staffs and spouses – long rumored to be the case for Bill Clinton.
The interview occurred when Clinton’s future remains unclear, and as another maybe-candidate for the 2016 Democratic nomination remains in place.
Joe Biden has not made his 2016 election intentions clear. But those close to the loquacious VP say that a third a presidential run is very much on his mind.