NYM: Where did it collapse?

HRC: Well, it collapsed at several points. It collapsed when Senator Dole decided that he was going to run for president. And he was advised by Republican strategists that they didn't want any kind of health-care bill. It collapsed also because the changes that both of us would have made were contrary to certain interests that were banded together.

NYM: How has that experience changed the approach you'll take if elected? And what Republicans in the Senate do you think you could establish good relations with?

HRC: Depending upon the issue, I think I could work with a lot of them. That's been the pattern of the last seven years, and that's the only way to be successful in the Senate. We all learned a lot from the health-care experience. From my perspective, even though I thought we tried to reach out and involve a lot of people, we were not successful in creating an awareness of how much of that was going on. I also learned that it's very difficult for anyone to present a piece of legislation to the Congress. Even if you're asked to do that. Because just as Senator Bradley found out with the details of his health-care plan, you are then subject to it being nitpicked apart.

NYM: How do you show that you're still there, in terms of leadership?

HRC: One of the ways is not to end the story at the White House and health care. You'd think that after health care, I'd taken to my bed with vapors or something, you know? And so it's my obligation to go to you and say, "Well, if you care about the following 25 things, here's what I've done on them." The work I did continued. I immediately began to work on the Children's Health Insurance Program. I wrote a best-selling book and gave away a million dollars to children's charities. I was the point person on welfare reform with a lot of the advocates' groups, 'cause I had worked with them, and I had to persuade them, insofar as I was able, to go along with the concessions that were made to get a bill passed. I started the emphasis in the administration on women and women's needs around the world as part of our foreign-policy objectives. I worked on microcredit. I worked to change the foster-care and adoption system.

People don't know that because I made a very, for me, pragmatic decision. I realized that because of the role I was in -- I mean, I have worked all my life, ever since I was 13. All of a sudden, I'm in this full-time-volunteer position. And the health-care issue was very polarizing. So I had to make a decision: How do I get things done in the time that I have here in the White House? How do I show leadership even if I don't immediately get credit for it? So that was what I chose to do.

NYM: One might suspect that Trent Lott would block something that has your name on it, simply because it has your name on it.

HRC: I don't think that works in the Senate, because there are too many individual prerogatives that you have to balance off if you're the majority leader of the Senate. I have no reason to believe that. Also, there are many ways of getting things done rather than being direct and confrontational. I will make alliances with people who you might not imagine that I could. Just a quick example: One of my great concerns in public life is the foster-care and adoption system. In the last seven years, we've been able to make changes that were never thought possible before. And we did that on a piece of legislation in this last Congress that meant a lot to me. Every year, 20,000 kids age out of the foster-care system. And usually what happens to those kids is that when they turn 18 or graduate from high school, whichever happens first, a social worker shows up in many jurisdictions with a black plastic garbage bag and says, "Put your stuff in, you're moving." And they have nowhere to move to.

So I worked with some members of Congress to change that. To provide some more support for these kids, to keep them on Medicaid, et cetera. I worked in the Senate with John Chafee. And in the House, I worked with somebody who's never had a good word to say about me or my husband -- Tom DeLay -- but who cares about foster care. I think he was as surprised as he could be that we invited him to the White House, that he was part of the team that we put together. He was very helpful in getting the legislation through.

NYM: Even people who really feel connected to you and don't feel connected to Rudy emotionally at all still see him as this guy who has tremendous executive ability. How do you compete with that force-of-nature kind of executive ability that the mayor conveys?

HRC: Well, the first thing I would say is that I don't deny that some good things have happened in the city. I love New York, you know, and the fact that many people who live here and work here are feeling better about this city I think is great. And I'm glad that he was mayor during a great economic boom that was contributed to in some great measure by the president's economic policies, and was given additional tools to fight crime. So he used the time well. And I applaud him for that. And he's a very tough opponent. He's gonna run a very hard campaign, I'm well aware of that.

But I think there are three major differences that people have to ask themselves about us when they're going to make their decision about voting. First, I don't think we need another Republican in the Senate. That's the first thing I'd ask New Yorkers to look at.

Second, there are significant differences between us on the issues. I think his support for the Republican budget plan, his support for George Bush, means that he would support the kinds of fiscal policies that would undermine the economic prosperity of New York and the country. I think if you look at public education, his whole policy is vouchers. Poverty has gone down around the nation; it has not gone down in New York City. New York now has the distinction of having the second-highest rate of poverty in the country and the biggest gap between the rich and the poor. I don't think that's acceptable.

And then, finally, there's a real contrast in leadership styles. Willingness to listen to people and actually learn from people. In the Senate, I would look for every possible way to work with my colleagues to try to get things done for New York. And I wouldn't expect if I disagreed with them, I could sue them or fire them.

But part of what I bring is that there is nothing anybody can say about me that will hurt my feelings. I cannot be insulted. You know? I just can't be. And so whatever comes in this campaign, or whatever will come in the future, my goal is as it was after health care: What can I do to help people and get things done?