Old lady presidential candidate half-heartedly greeting sage (9)
I believe the answer is:
maharishi
'sage' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)
'old lady presidential candidate half-heartedly greeting' is the wordplay.
I cannot really understand how this works, but
'greeting' could be 'hi' (hi is a kind of greeting) and 'hi' is found in the answer.
'old lady' could be 'ma' (both can informally mean mother) and 'ma' is found within the answer.
This explanation may well be incorrect...
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for maharishi that I've seen before include "Spiritual teacher" , "Indian sage" , "Hindu sage and scholar" , "leading teacher" , "Teacher of Hindu mysticism" .)