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When Hillary Rodham Clinton premiered her husband at his first official appearance in her presidential campaign, it was a strictly choreographed affair, designed to cast the former two-term president in the traditional role of supporting spouse and to contain his political lustre lest it overshadow hers. That was on a summer day at the Iowa State Fairgrounds in Des Moines, and Bill Clinton stood behind his wife, his hands resting supportively on her shoulders. Back then, the main concern about Bill was that once he opened his mouth, he might make Hillary sound a bit too wooden, a bit too Al Gore to Bill Clinton's Bill Clinton.

Yet no one doubted that Bill would be an asset to her campaign, drawing huge crowds to her events. And Hillary relished reminding her audiences about the good ol' days of her husband's administration in the 1990s, when deficits were surpluses, and Americans enjoyed good relations with their allies. "It did take a Clinton to clean up after the first Bush," she liked to quip. "And I think it might take another one to clean up after the second Bush."

For a time it looked like Bill might be for Hillary what Dick Cheney was for candidate George W. Bush — a white-haired, reassuring presence, one that, in the case of the Clintons, said, "she might be the first woman president but she'll have a steady hand in the storm." But it seems that trusting the old guy in the corner didn't work any better for Hillary than it did for George W. Both steady hands have led them straight into hot water.

What started out as a few ill-tempered comments on the campaign trail in South Carolina now has more and more Americans asking what precisely Bill Clinton's role would be in Hillary's potential White House — and whether she'd be able to control him. Much has been made of the novelty of the first "first gentleman." But the more serious question concerns the unprecedented scenario of a former president — a politically talented and famously irrepressible former president — returning to the White House in a country whose constitution forbids a third term. It's a question that had not figured in the campaign until Bill Clinton himself caused it to be raised — and now Hillary Clinton is having trouble putting it to rest.

The irony is that, until her husband's racially tinged comments in South Carolina, Hillary Clinton had done a masterful job as senator for New York, building her own persona. She would even take aim at some of his policies, for example, criticizing NAFTA, a key accomplishment of his presidency. But Bill Clinton managed to undo that. "This latest series of questions is a completely self-inflicted wound on Bill Clinton's part," says Gil Troy, a McGill University historian who has authored books on the Clintons and other U.S. presidential couples. "What is his vision for his role? What is motivating him beyond undying love for this woman he treated so beautifully over the years? It's a fascinating question."

Whether by instinct or by design, Bill Clinton abandoned the high-mindedness he'd previously cultivated, and took to the attack-dog role with disturbing gusto. He began attacking Barack Obama's lack of experience, calling a potential Obama presidency a "roll of the dice." He referred to the Illinois senator as a "kid" — even as others in the Clinton campaign were trying to label Obama the "black candidate." With the race issue stirring, South Carolina turned against Hillary in numbers greater than polls had predicted.

Things boiled over after that loss, with Bill Clinton comparing Obama to former black candidate Jesse Jackson. It was seen as belittling. "Jesse Jackson won South Carolina in '84 and '88. Jackson ran a good campaign. And Obama ran a good campaign here." The implication? Obama was just another black candidate in a state where African-Americans make up more than half the Democratic primary voters — a put-down to a man who was running not as a black candidate in the mould of Jackson, but as the "post-racial" son of a black father and white mother who had scored a decisive victory in Iowa, where the black population was less than three per cent.

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