Hillary Clinton is probably the last person Sarah Palin wants to see in the Oval Office. Which makes Palin’s near-endorsement of Clinton a bit of a head-scratcher. But Palin, despite the smears back in 2008, is a lot smarter than the left-leaning press has ever been willing to admit.

“I would like to see women run for the higher office. I think America certainly is ready for more female candidates at that upper echelon,” Palin told Mario Lopez on “Extra” when he asked about a Clinton run. And the stunned speculation about why Palin would say anything nice about Clinton began.

The fact is, Clinton is a dream candidate for the Republican Party in 2016.

Never mind all those polls that say Clinton walks away with it.

The Clintons have enough skeletons in their political closet to petrify a haunted house — and Bill, the former impeached president, will be a part of this race, too, as the nation’s prospective first First Husband.

The Democratic-friendly media has already been forced to notice the way she attacked the women her unfaithful husband targeted, though her party is supposed to be all about protecting the sisterhood.

Eventually, the media will have to address why it does make a difference who killed our ambassador and three other Americans in Benghazi.

There’s the question of whether — given her angry outburst before Congress — she has the temperament to be president.

By 2016, Iran — aided by Clinton and President Obama’s exercise of soft power — may well have nukes.

Secretary of State John Kerry accidentally gave Bashir Assad his lifeline with that Russian-brokered chemical weapons deal, but Clinton missed the chance to support a real Syrian democracy movement, before al-Qaeda co-opted it. Then, there’s her support for Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood.

Now, thanks to Crimea, Clinton’s infamous Russian “reset” rings hollow. That phone Clinton was ready to answer at 3 a.m.? It turns out it was … not in service.

Then, there’s Obama-care. Clinton was a major failed proponent of big government health care even before Obama succeeded in making a mess of it.

Palin, who couldn’t catch a break back in 2008, probably wouldn’t mind seeing Clinton catch a little of that political heat.

But maybe, Palin was doing the last thing her detractors would ever expect — voicing a laudable ideal, taking the high road, with no partisanship at all.

Maybe Palin, actually thinks, as she stated, that it’s good for women to run for high office. Women, no matter what their politics, should be running for high office. Maybe that’s all Palin was trying to say.

Adriana Cohen is co-host of Trending Now. Follow her on Twitter @AdrianaCohen16.