Mayor Bloomberg spoke for all New Yorkers when he put in a telephone call to Senator Clinton to pass an encouraging word to President Clinton and let them both know that we’re all thinking of them during the medical crisis.

And all of us were glad to hear that Mr. Clinton had come through his quadruple bypass successfully and was awake and beginning his recovery. He’ll be back on the road soon and before long able to resume a completely normal life – perhaps better than before. That, at least, has been the experience of some of our acquaintances who have had arterial blockages dealt with by the kind of surgery Mr. Clinton has undergone.

The sooner Mr. Clinton is back in action, the better for the Democrats. It was tragedy for the Democrats that Vice President Gore and Senator Lieberman turned their back on the Clinton formula when they left Los Angeles four years ago. They veered far to the left and lost the election. How strange that Senator Kerry chose to base so much of his campaign on his Vietnam war service, since, in 1992, Mr. Clinton had demonstrated that voters have long since accepted that many avoided the war, for noble reasons or otherwise. Our sense is that Mr. Kerry had begun to alienate many who, like Mr. Clinton, had failed to serve in Vietnam when they had the chance.

Shortly before Mr. Clinton went in for his operation, he was on the phone with the senator from Massachusetts, reportedly telling him to quit harping on Vietnam. Mr. Clinton is, like Mr. Reagan was, a master of big-tent politics, able to construct a grid on which voters with all sorts of interests could perch. Mr. Kerry and the Democrats need him and his good cheer. This, in turn, is no doubt why so many letters, telegrams, e-mails, phone calls and other messages are pouring in to New York Presbyterian Hospital with good wishes for the man from Hope. It’s a reminder that however bitter the political campaign, simpler and warmer emotions also animate Americans.