As Fred Thompson, actor-lawyer-politician nears his much anticipated official announcement as a presidential candidate, his wife, Jeri, is being slurred by liberal media and Democrat operatives as a “trophy wife.” Jeri, at age 40 is 24 years younger than her husband. She is also beautiful, intelligent and powerful. Bill Clinton must be eating his heart out!
No ‘trophy wife’ she, after working for the Senate Republican Conference and the Republican National Committee, she became a big-time political media consultant in Washington. She has been intimately involved in the planning of her husband's campaign, including last week's staff shakeup. When Tom Collamore left as Thompson's campaign manager, he told CNN that he was "very respectful of the desire of Fred and Jeri to make some changes as they move to the next level." Those comments indicated that whoever ran this campaign would have to answer to the candidate's wife.
Thompson, making light of this at his $1,000-a-ticket fund-raiser at he Marriott hotel in down Washington this week, reflects the cool reaction to crisis he has displayed as GOP counsel of the Watergate investigation, U.S. senator from Tennessee and many dramatic roles (most recently district attorney of Manhattan).That he is in a commanding position for the nomination may explain the extraordinary attention paid to his wife.
The spectacle of liberal media pithily demeaning the wife of a man who is not yet a presidential candidate should not be surprising. It just shows how seriously they fear a Thompson presidential bid and also belies their wobbly faith in their own Democrat field.
