Hillary's on her way

With her own re-election to the U.S. Senate seat from New York looking more like a slam-dunk every day, Sen. Hillary Clinton seems to have some time on her hands -- so she is turning her attention westward to Ohio.

Saturday, Clinton will be the headline draw at a private fundraiser in Cleveland for Rep. Sherrod Brown, the Lorain Democrat taking on Republican incumbent Mike DeWine.

The junior senator from New York will return to Ohio in July for a fundraiser at a private resident in Columbus, the beneficiary of that event being gubernatorial candidate Ted Strickland.

You wouldn't be going too far out on a limb to say that public opinion in Ohio is split on Sen. Clinton, and her likey bid for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2008. But she, like her husband, can sell tickets to a political fundraiser like nobody's business, so both the Brown and Strickland camps say they will welcome her with open arms.

But note that both campaigns are holding "private'' events and neither will be dragging her out in public.