Bill Clinton: My critique of Obama was wrong

In his new book, former President Bill Clinton laments that President Obama and Democrats in Congress could have done a better job negotiating with Republicans over raising the debt ceiling. But on Tuesday night, Mr. Clinton said one of his former advisers who now works for Mr. Obama convinced him that section of his book is wrong.

"I was wrong," Mr. Clinton bluntly said to an audience at the New York Historical Society, Politico reports.

In his book "Back to Work," the former president said that Mr. Obama and the Democrats should have insisted on raising the debt limit (the legal limit the government is allowed to borrow) when Mr. Obama agreed in December 2010 to extend the Bush-era tax cuts for another two years. Instead, after Republicans took control of the House, Congress waged a high-pitched partisan battle over extending the debt limit in the spring of 2011.

Historically, raising the debt limit has been a non-controversial matter for Congress, but this year, emboldened by their 2010 victories, Republicans framed the debt limit vote as a principled fight over deficit spending.

At the Historical Society Tuesday night, Mr. Clinton said White House Economic adviser Gene Sperling emailed him to say that the Obama administration did try to leverage the Bush tax cut extension in exchange for an extension of the debt limit. Mr. Clinton said that Sperling assured him, "Oh, we tried," and blamed the failed effort on a filibuster threat from Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell.

Mr. Clinton said he had incorrectly believed Senate rules wouldn't have allowed for a filibuster on this particular vote, Politico reports.

While Sperling may have told Mr. Clinton that the Obama White House tried to include debt limit talks in their agreement to extend the Bush tax cuts, the White House gave no indication of that in 2010.

When Mr. Obama announced at a December 7, 2010 press conference that he would extend the tax cuts, he was asked specifically if he attempted to include a debt limit increase in the deal. Mr. Obama said he wasn't worried about Republicans taking over the House.

"Here's my expectation -- and I'll take [incoming House Speaker] John Boehner at his word -- that nobody, Democrat or Republican, is willing to see the full faith and credit of the United States government collapse, that that would not be a good thing to happen," Mr. Obama said. "And so I think that there will be significant discussions about the debt limit vote. That's something that nobody ever likes to vote on. But once John Boehner is sworn in as Speaker, then he's going to have responsibilities to govern. You can't just stand on the sidelines and be a bomb thrower."