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The clone emperor seems to be an albatross on the early Expanded Universe, and Dark Empire more specifically, though it has some other problems people disliked. I'm not sure I can think of anyone that ever expressed any positive emotions toward the concept.
But I liked the usage! It was a pretty neat metaphor, I think. A while back, someone pointed me toward a quote by Tom Veitch from Star Wars Galaxy magazine #13,
From my point of view, I think it’s profoundly important to “penetrate the dark side and learn its secrets.” That’s the hero’s main task, in fact — not simply killing off his enemies. A personality that is divided into warring opposites must somehow become whole and complete. Carl Jung would call it “integrating the Shadow.” The three existing Star Wars films are about the battle of the hero and the Shadow in the form of the dark father. If there are ever to be filmed sequels to the current trilogy, it would be logical and mythologically satisfying to somehow depict “integrating the Shadow.” In psychological terms, that would be inevitable, as part of the process of reunification of the galaxy and the re-emergence of the Jedi Knights. If the dark side is simply suppressed, pushed into the unconscious, then it will surely rise again.
So Palpatine's return is a literal manifestation of the idea that the dark side can't be killed off, but must be integrated. Luke can choose to kill Palpatine again when he first encounters him again in Dark Empire, but such a means of dealing with him would ultimately be a wasted effort because he would revive again as another clone. Thus, Luke's choice is practical as well as philosophical. He apprentices himself to Palpatine to figure out how to defeat him -- as well as to "penetrate the dark side and learn its secrets," as Veitch puts it.
Reviving Palpatine is not the most eloquent way to do the method, as it could have been accomplished with another antagonist capable of the same feat, but that was probably outside of the scope of a six issue series, and could have drawn the same criticism vis-a-vis using cloning to obtain immortality.
I think most would find issue with the usage of Palpatine now due to the context that the prequel trilogy provided, and even before that it could have been argued that resurrecting Palpatine works to diminish Anakin's sacrifice.
I'd argue against the former that the proliferation of Sith in the post-film timeline equally diminishes the impact of the prophecy itself, whereas I don't think that the latter argument is true because Anakin sacrificed himself to save Luke, not to kill Palpatine. Killing Palpatine was a means to an end, not an end itself, and Palpatine's survival is irrelevant to what Anakin sacrificed himself for. He died for his son.
I thought it was an interesting idea that perhaps could have been detached from Palpatine and explored more deeply in a different medium. And to some degree, it has!
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