The Secretary of State is making all sort of headlines lately, and most of them don’t have much to do with her current job. (A woman with limitless options who is desired by 90% of the Democrats.) The word has hit the streets that Hillary Clinton’s future is pretty much cast in solid gold plated stone. At Town Hall, Steve Chapman identifies the lay of the land

The votes have been cast, the count has been completed, and we all know the winner of the presidential election. So now it’s just a matter of letting the Electoral College meet to make the outcome official. Then we can get along with planning the inauguration of Hillary Clinton.

True, it’s still four years away. But by now it’s clear that Republicans needn’t bother putting up a nominee. They may as well save their money and candidates for 2024, when Hillary will be ready to leave Washington and become a judge on “The Voice.”

The secretary of state is currently more popular than ice cream in August. Matched by Public Policy Polling against a field of other possible contenders for the 2016 Democratic nomination, she got 61 percent among primary voters — well ahead of second-place Joe Biden, with 12 percent….

In May, a Gallup survey found that 66 percent of those polled had a favorable opinion of her. Only 29 percent didn’t like her. Let’s face it, you could probably find that many people who don’t like Kermit the Frog.

So since it’s already pretty much over, I shouldn’t feel bad about airing a few grievances. For full disclosure, I do not come to this subject from some nonpartisan, detached position, as I’m about to explain. I do not like Hillary Clinton. In fact, I pretty much despise her, and have for quite some time. I was angry at her during her time as First Lady when duties involving public policy were essentially handed over to a non-elected (and thereby unaccountable) person simply because she was married to a politician. I was put off by her transparently political, “stand by your man” routine when Bill’s affairs were revealed. (Let’s face it, no matter how skillful of a politician he was, Bill Clinton was a dog. And as a husband he was an embarrassment. She should have had enough pride in herself to give him the boot.) I was frustrated with Hillary when she came on her first carpetbagging tour to my home state of New York to steal our Senate seat. (Though perhaps not as disgusted as I was with the people of the state who took to their fainting couches in droves to coronate her.) It just seems like every experience I’ve ever had involving Hillary Clinton was negative.

So is she really on a glide path to the White House if she decides to run? Just possibly not as much as some may think.

But she won’t have the smooth, flower-strewn path to the Oval Office that all this suggests. During her husband’s presidency, she was widely disliked for her hectoring manner, her more-liberal-than-Bill views and her often chilly personality. Not for nothing was she known in her college days as “Sister Frigidaire.”

It’s easy to forget that she was the architect of a major health insurance overhaul that ended in crashing failure. It’s easy to forget that when the Monica Lewinsky affair broke, she dismissed the allegations as slanders from a “vast right-wing conspiracy” trying to “undo the results of two elections.” It’s easy to forget that she was the most unpopular first lady on record.

If she enters the race, we would be reminded of the strife and scandal of the Clinton presidency. We would also be reminded that electing Hillary would mean bringing back Bill, with his notorious appetites and unpredictable impulses.

One or two bimbo eruptions could be fatal — and did you see that story the other day that Gennifer Flowers said he tried to renew their trysts?

I’m not sure how much of Chapman’s take on this is accurate prognostication and how much is wishful thinking, but I certainly hope it’s more of the former. There will have to be a primary, as there are plenty of Democrats who have an appetite for the big chair, and I refuse to believe everyone is just going to wave off the landing to pave the way for her. And the GOP isn’t just going to lay down and die. There is a long history between Hillary and the Republican Party, and plenty of stuff in the records which will all come to light again.

But the country definitely has an appetite to see the first woman president and there’s no denying it. And she’s leaving her current position with strong favorable numbers and four years to plan while having no responsibilities where she might slip up. If it comes to that, though, you can bet I’ll be working hard for the GOP nominee, no matter who we manage to put up next time. Like I said… I just don’t like the woman. And I’m not going to apologize for it.