WASHINGTON - Hillary Clinton was back in the spotlight on Tuesday doing a series of television interviews in which she ruled out running for president in 2012 and said she wasn't interested in any high-level positions if Barack Obama becomes president.
In an interview on the Fox News Channel, Clinton, who fought a bitter battle with Obama for the Democratic presidential nomination, was asked to rate on a scale of one to 10 her chances of making another bid for the White House.
"Probably close to zero," she said.
She added she had no interest in being nominated to the U.S. Supreme Court, or of becoming the Senate majority leader.
"I'm not seeking any other position than to be the best senator from New York that I can be ... there's an old saying: `Bloom where you're planted,"' she said, adding she simply looked forward to working in the Senate with an Obama administration.
"I ran for president because I thought we had to make drastic changes, given what I viewed as the damage that the Bush administration had done here at home and abroad. Now I'm going to work very hard with President Obama to repair that damage."
Clinton's rounds on the all-news networks represented a return to the spotlight since her gracious and conciliatory speech at the Democratic National Convention in Denver in August.
Since then, she's kept a relatively low profile, although she's made more than 50 campaign stops for Obama, including in the pivotal state of Pennsylvania with her husband Bill, along with Joe Biden, Obama's vice-presidential running mate.
Bill Clinton has said repeatedly that his wife has done more work for Obama than any other runner-up in U.S. history.
But when the Illinois senator was neck and neck with McCain in the two weeks following his pick of Palin, some worried Democrats wanted Clinton to reiterate her convention instructions to her embittered supporters: vote for Obama if you truly care about the issues.
Those concerns came amid the McCain campaign's claim that they had lured one in five disgruntled Clinton backers in the two weeks after Palin was named to the ticket. Since then, women have moved almost en masse back to Obama.
There were also suggestions that Clinton, as the Democrats' biggest female star, should have been the party's attack dog against Palin, pointing out the Alaska governor's lack of experience and her anti-choice stances.
But just like the Obama campaign, Clinton -- famously spoofed by Amy Poehler on "Saturday Night Live" as seething at the notion that Palin might make it to the White House while she wouldn't -- said little about Palin.
On Tuesday, however, Clinton took some not-so-subtle shots at Palin, who credited the former first lady with shattering the glass ceiling for women in politics and helping pave the way for the self-styled hockey mom's own political successes.
"I would like to see the very first woman in the White House who I agree with and who I think has policies that would really fulfil the goals that I have for our country," Clinton said when asked what she thought of the possibility of Palin serving as vice-president.
"Of course, it's exciting to have a woman on the ticket. The Democrats had a vice- presidential candidate as a woman back in 1984. The Republicans did it this year. But that, in and of itself, is not enough reason ... I am going to be supporting women and men with whom I agree, who I believe have the right policies and the right ideas about what's best for America."
Clinton was also faced with some difficult questions about the flailing McCain campaign's recent attempts to attack Obama's character and associations by raising his relationship with William Ayers, a onetime domestic terrorist who once served on a community board with the Illinois senator.
McCain has been pilloried for that tactic, with many saying it's inciting anger and hatred among Republican supporters, but it's a strategy Clinton herself employed during her primary battles against Obama.
"I think that all kinds of issues are raised in campaigns, but it really depends upon how they're raised, and Senator Obama and his campaign have responded to this," she said on CNN.
"Certainly it's time to move on and focus on what Americans are concerned about."
She also assured viewers that any hard feelings she may have felt after losing to Obama were long past.
"You know, it isn't anymore," she said on NBC when asked if it was difficult for her and her husband to campaign for Obama.
"I mean obviously when you run a hard-fought campaign, there is a lot of emotion attached to it. You believe you'd be the best president, you give it all you've got, but you know, that wasn't meant to be."
