Could Hillary Clinton Be America’s Thatcher?

April 17 (Bloomberg) -- Who thought that in stuffy oldEngland in the 1980s a woman could act like a man and thrive,but here in the New World, Hillary Clinton still has to watchher p’s and q’s in 2013? Margaret Thatcher didn’t change a hair,hedge a bet or trim a sail. She never had to be told to lean inbecause she never leaned back. She was certain, opinionated andstrident to the point of, yes, shrillness. Listen to her on gayrights: It’s fingernails on a chalkboard.

In the U.S., three decades after Thatcher, a woman stillhas to back into her positions. Watch Hillary come out for same-sex marriage in a well-rehearsed video -- after it was entirelysafe. (Every Democratic senator but three politically vulnerableresidents of red states has done so.) After leaving her post assecretary of state, she lay low, got some rest and cleaned outher closets. When she re-emerged, she did so at soft-focuswomen’s events and at her husband’s philanthropy, the ClintonGlobal Initiative.