From the perspective of the President's new (or, rather, second-term-Clinton-revisited) political triangulation strategy, it's already working.

"The triangulation strategy was an implicit repudiation of the Democrats' agenda," Mr. Reich said.

Perhaps more loyally than candidly, she does not express concern about his campaign-mode handling of social and health issues she knows intimately, nor does she criticize his "triangulation" strategy of pre-empting conservative Republican initiatives to seize the middle ground.

One of the most widely cited capstones of Clinton's triangulation strategy was when, in his 1996 State of the Union Address, Clinton declared that the "era of big government is over."

In the White House, especially after the president embarked on his "triangulation" strategy, there was a tactical value in having Clinton's influential wife cast in the role of liberal emissary.

In today's speech he accused Mr. Clinton of a "triangulation strategy," a term politicians are using to refer to the White House's apparent strategy of creating distance between the President and both Republicans and Democrats in Congress.

He said voters will not like President Clinton's triangulation strategy - moving to the center and keeping himself at arm's length from Congressional Democrats and Republicans.

Not unlike the Clinton "triangulation" strategy, the approach has been to attack an opponent's greatest perceived strength in order to diminish his overall credibility.

His "triangulation" strategy was to turn the White House into Halfway House: In this widely advertised midcourse correction, Mr. Clinton accepted a tax cut, agreed to end key entitlements, even went along with balancing the budget someday.