Clinton joyfully wallowed in his 50 minutes of spotlight. He talked of bipartisan cooperation as a hallmark of his time in office. He complimented Republican presidents for teaming up with him on this and that in later years and even admitted he liked Republicans for their sincerity. He tried to apply some of his own bipartisan gloss to Obama. Unfortunately for the current president, it doesn’t stick.

For instance, nobody can call Obamacare a shining light on Cooperation Hill. It was Hamburger Hill, jammed through without a single Republican idea incorporated into more than 1,000 pages. The bill passed along party lines in the Senate and with 34 Democrats and all 178 Republicans voting against it in the House. Freight trains are not usually thought of as cooperative machines.

It’s true that Clinton worked cooperatively with Republicans, but not in the beginning. Remember Hillarycare, the first big initiative? Not so cooperative. It was not until Republicans seized the majority in both houses of Congress in the 1994 midterms that Clinton — a genuine centrist, as opposed to hard-left Obama — saw the light.  After that, he achieved his balanced budgets.

So now he was back on stage in the role of Rebutter-in-Chief talking about last week’s Republican convention. Clinton is a master at moving his audience with his down-home style and detailed grasp of policy, and he served up a feast of potential talking points for the Mitt Romney campaign. If Romney just ticks down Clinton’s menu for ideas, he should fare well in the coming presidential debates. Obama is not in the same league.