WITH FRIENDS LIKE THESE...

Bill Clinton has a new book coming out, and if this AP story is accurate, it may not be helpful to the current president (however justified Clinton's criticisms may be):

... While he generally praises Obama for taking steps to mitigate the financial crisis and deep recession, he also gently dings the president for poor communication and strategic misfires....

Clinton ... criticizes Obama and other Democratic lawmakers for not making a stronger case for the steps they took to stabilize the U.S. economy in 2009, like the bank and auto company bailouts and the $787 billion economic stimulus program.

Campaigning for Democrats in the 2010 midterm elections, Clinton said he took it on himself to explain "in plain language" what Obama and the party had accomplished. He says in the book he was thwarted because Democrats had no national message to counter the anti-government headwinds they were facing....

Bill Clinton says he and Vice President Joe Biden urged the Democratic National Committee to distribute a clear set of talking points to activists so they would know how to discuss what the party had accomplished.

"We couldn't persuade the decision makers to do so," Clinton said....

Clinton recalls his own eight years in the White House in glowing terms, noting how his economic policies helped create 22 million jobs and substantially reduce the federal debt. Among other things, he says, he was able to persuade many wealthy people to accept higher taxes because "I didn't attack them for their success." ...

You know what, Bill? According to a recent poll, more than two thirds of millionaires support higher taxes on the wealthy. The difference is that the self-selected billionaire defenders of the plutocracy in your presidency set out to destroy you personally, and maybe your heath care plan, whereas their counterparts today have set out to destroy the president by destroying the entire economy, and keeping it in a state of disrepair until their hit job is accomplished.

I generally agree with what Clinton says about communication. I question his contention that the debt ceiling could have been raised before the GOP seized the House in 2011. (In 2009, maybe, but probably very early, before Republicans knew the teabag comeback strategy would work -- and who in early 2009 thought that would be necessary? After the tea party got geared up, I honestly think Republicans would have stalled it by any means necessary, including the filibuster.)

But the thought I'm having from this story is: you know who actually would have mounted a primary challenge to Obama for 2012, if it were allowed? This guy. His wife chose not to run, but I think he would have made a different choice.