Clinton: Starry island nights

Hillary and Bill Clinton are headed to Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket next month for a star-studded fundraising swing on familiar turf. While they were in the White House in the 1990s, they vacationed many summers on the Vineyard, partying and golfing with local celebrities.

At their home in Edgartown, former Viacom chief executive Frank Biondi and wife Carol are hosting a bash with more big names and longtime Clinton friends than we can count. Among them are actors Mary Steenburgen and Ted Danson, designer Kenneth Cole, Boston philanthropist Barbara Lee, JFK daughter Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg, and veteran Clinton advisor Vernon Jordan.

Tickets for the August 25 party go for $2,300 for the whole affair, or $1000 to attend the reception but skip the "town hall conversation."

Former Clinton administration ambassador Elizabeth Frawley Bagley and her husband, Smith Bagley, are hosting a similar evening on Nantucket on August 24.

Sandwiched inbetween is an event for the Vineyard masses, a $50-a-ticket fundraiser at the Tabernacle in Oak Bluffs.

Other presidential candidates have also found fundraising a convenient excuse to visit the Cape and Islands this summer. Barack Obama comes to Cape Cod for a fund-raiser in mid-August, and Republican Fred Thompson, expected to jump into the race, was picking up checks over the weekend in North Chatham.