Vetting process for Hillary Rodham Clinton’s candidacy for secretary of state may have some snags.

Three prominent lawyers have been engaged by Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton to help President-elect Barack Obama vet her candidacy for secretary of state even as some insiders criticized the pick and advisers to the former first lady said she was weighing whether to take the job if Obama offered it.

Clinton’s background and finances, including Bill Clinton’s post-presidential business deals and relationships with foreign governments, are being reviewed by Attorneys Cheryl Mills, David Kendall and Robert Barnett are working with the Obama transition team,. The three attorneys represented the Clintons on legal matters in the White House, including President Clinton’s dalliance with intern Monica Lewinsky that led to his impeachment in 1998.

According to Officials who are knowledgeable about the vetting, it has gone smoothly and both Clintons are cooperating fully.

It appears as if Bill Clinton has already taken an important step toward smoothing his wife’s path to the job.

It is said by Democrats who are familiar with the negotiations that the former president has suggested he would step away from day-to-day responsibility for his charitable foundation while his wife served and would alert the State Department to his speaking schedule and any new sources of income.

There was nothing obvious in the former president’s dealings that would torpedo his wife’s prospects for the job, a top aide involved in the vetting said. However, the top aide was not authorized to discuss the matter, and said it was only related to background.

Former President George H.W. Bush has given paid speeches and participated in international business ventures since his son, George W. Bush, has been president without stirring public complaints about a conflict of interest the aide pointed out that.

However, according to another Democrat who advised Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign, Bill Clinton’s business arrangements were more complicated than many people realized. Few of her senior strategists knew anything about the former president’s business deals and whether they would hold up under scrutiny if she won the nomination, this person said.

It remains unclear whether Bill Clinton has agreed to submit financial information to the transition team that has not been made public through Hillary Clinton’s Senate disclosure requirements or during her campaign, when the couple released several years of joint tax returns.

Case in point, the names of donors to Bill Clinton’s foundation and presidential library or what he earns as a partner with Yucaipa Global Opportunities Fund, a private investment venture run by billionaire Ron Burkle, a close friend, are still unknown.

Obama pressed the former president to name the donors to his library during his primary campaign against Hillary Clinton. Saying many had given money on the condition that their names not be revealed, Bill Clinton refused. However, he did promise to make the donors’ names public going forward if his wife won the Democratic nomination.

There are other deals that the former president has engaged in that could complicate his wife’s work with foreign governments as secretary of state. According to records, he raised money for his foundation from the Saudi royal family, Kuwait, Brunei and the Embassy of Qatar, and from a Chinese Internet company seeking information on Tibetan human rights activists.

Some people say she is considering the consequences of leaving the Senate, where she had hoped to take a leading role on health care reform and other issues, while others familiar with the New York senator’s thinking say she is inclined to take the secretary of state’s job if it is offered,.

Lanny Davis, a former Clinton adviser not involved in the vetting said, “Would she be willing to give up her independent stature in the U.S. Senate, Robert F. Kennedy’s seat, to be in the Cabinet? It will be a considerable decision for her. It’s a completely different life than you lead in the Senate, where you are your own spokesperson, your own advocate. When you join the Cabinet of the president of the United States, it is no longer the case.”

“I’ve said everything I have to say on Friday,” stated Senator Clinton while declining to discuss any part of the selection process Tuesday.

Meanwhile, at the State Department, the prospect of Clinton as secretary is creating some anxiety among career foreign-service officers worried that she would install her own loyalists and exclude them from policy making. There are some at the State Department who see her as a foreign policy lightweight, although there is grudging acknowledgment of her star power. However, there are others closer to the Obama camp who have criticized Clinton’s credentials for the job.

There are people like Greg Craig who is a law school classmate of both Clintons and led President Clinton’s defense team during his impeachment trial. He wrote a scorching memo during the primary campaign attacking Hillary Clinton’s claim to have brokered foreign policy deals during her husband’s presidency.

Craig, an early Obama supporter likely to be White House counsel, wrote in March, “There is no reason to believe … that she was a key player in foreign policy at any time during the Clinton administration. She did not sit in on National Security Council meetings. She did not have a security clearance. She did not attend meetings in the Situation Room,” Craig continued. He finally added, “She did not manage any part of the national security bureaucracy, nor did she have her own national security staff. She did not do any heavy lifting with foreign governments, whether they were friendly or not.”

For the team at TicosLand.com, the leading web directory in Costa Rica, the process of setting up a presidential cabinet in the United States is very interesting. The maneuvering that takes place and all of the hurdles involved are quite intricate. Costa Rica has a mature democracy and it seems as if the more mature a democracy gets, the more red tape that is involved in the governmental processes.

Tags: bill clinton, Costa Rica, hillary rodham clinton, secretary of state, vetting