For me, the great political mystery of the last two years is not what makes Barack Obama tick, or where the Tea Party came from, but Hillary Clinton. Namely, why did she give up life tenure in a U.S. Senate seat from New York to join the Obama administration as secretary of state? I seem to be alone in my mystification.

The most compelling reason she took the job, I was informed during 2008-09, was obvious: Barack Obama’s presidency would be an historic presidency, and she had wisely embraced an opportunity to join the bandwagon. At the time, however, I felt otherwise, and thought she was foolish to abandon the Senate. Harry Reid was (and remains) a mediocre majority leader, and Edward Kennedy was dying. Once Kennedy passed from the scene, Clinton would have been the alpha Democratic senator, de facto leader of her party to whom her colleagues looked for guidance, and the only member with anything like a national following. Moreover, as a senator, Clinton would have no executive responsibilities–no record of failure–and as a member of the world’s greatest deliberative body, full freedom to say whatever she liked, at all times.