Give the Clintons credit. They have at least enough self-awareness to understand when they have not been self-aware.
Hillary Clinton let slip a moderately damaging assessment of her family's post presidency finances. "We were dead broke," she said.
Should she run for president, she will find those four words as ubiquitous as Mitt Romney's offhand 47 percent comment. She will have to explain ad nauseum what she meant and that she does really understand what truly broke really means.
This will likely grow tiresome. Neither Clinton entered the world with guaranteed millions and both, especially Bill, understand what poverty feels like. Saying "dead broke" instead of struggling to meet responsibilities was a huge error in judgment.
The Clintons, however, did the right thing. When confronted with their own version of tough times, like good free market entrepreneurs, they cashed in. People wrongly envy Bill Clinton's huge speaking fees. There is nothing wrong with making top dollar. The onus lies on those who pay the fees, especially if they pay from the public purse. Bill Clinton or the town dog catcher can ask a million dollars to speak. No one has to pay.
Problem is that being Democrats comes with connection to the party's ideology. One cannot just comfortably defend a million (or tens of millions) dollars honestly made. Nationally, the Democratic Party has moved well to the Left of the centrist comfort zone Bill Clinton always claimed. If Hillary runs in 2016, Leftist candidates such as Martin O'Malley (does anyone doubt that this failure is running for president?) will hurl this statement back at her over and over. Clinton will face class warfare, this time against her and the profits reaped by her family after the presidency.
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