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 Senator Hillary Clinton is ‘in it to win it’ in her quest to be
the 44th president of the United States of America
and at present her closest challenger is trailing her by double
digits. Senator Barack Obama even trails her by double digits in a
poll of Afro-American Democrats at present.
By far she is the
clear and frontrunner in the Democratic field. For any
candidate the long hard fought race will be about unforeseen
challenges and candidates will be taken to task on a whole list
of issues, but Senator Clinton seems to have a well oiled
machine at the onset. Her opponents will eventually have to
attack hard and use all of the arsenals in their war chest to
get on the same playing field.
In 2004 Governor Howard Dean had a lot of momentum and media
buzz and Senator John Kerry had the establishment and years
of political favors to cash in. In the 2008 Campaign Hillary
Clinton sits in a similar position of having the overwhelming
support of the Democratic establishment. She has vast Democratic
network of supporters and will not feel the need to get into a
battle in the primary unless her poll numbers start to slip.
Being the front has the obvious advantage of the powers of
the donor purse, but the worry in the Clinton camp would have to
be peaking early in the race and being position to withstand the
onslaught of attacks from the likes of Edwards, Obama, Vilsack,
Biden, Dodd and others.
Look for 5 persuasive attacks on
Senator Hillary Clinton to dethrone her as frontrunner.
1. Hillary
Clinton has never been challenged in a debate by
the likes of Edwards and Obama. The New York
State challengers were no match, but look for
Hillary's Democratic opponents to be tough with
Hillary specifically on the Iraq war and line by
line of her policy proposals.
2. True leadership is the ability to say you’ve made a mistake
and move on. It took Bush’s November ‘thumping’ to make him
state he made mistakes. Colin Powell has used words like, “It
was painful” and “I was enormously disappointed” in going before
the world to state the US position leading up to the evasion of
Iraq, but Hillary has yet to be able to provide the words to
assuage the many Democrats who want her to say more than the ‘if
I knew what I know now’ or her attempt to position the
blame on the current administration. Look for her opponents to
get her to definitively state simply she made a
mistake and then attack her for not doing it
sooner.
3. The question
of Hillary Clinton's ability to '...win it' in a
general election will be presented to Democratic
voters. Does all the baggage from her past
deem her too polarizing of a figure to garner
the moderate and independent mantra of the
November elections?
4. Look for challengers to ask the Democratic base to not allow
another Bush/Clinton decade. The candidate who can articulately
state it is in our interests to not be defined by the same
political Bush/Clinton tree. Obama has already positioned his
campaign against the old partisan politics of
divisiveness and the other candidates will stump
asking Americans to do better than old style
politics. Look for groups operating outside the
campaigns to put the Rose Law Firm, cattle
futures, Vince Foster, accusations of using the
'N' in the past, Whitewater and pricy
gifts received when the Clintons were in the
White House back into the talk show circuit.
5. If anyone other than Hillary wins the nomination they will be
successful in separating her from the enormous success of her
husband and even reminding voters in a peripheral way the moral
failures of the Clinton household.
Analysts are wrong
in stating it is Hillary's race to lose. In 2008
she will have to do more than smile. Voters will
want to see something different in this
race.
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