"Hillary in 2008?" by Amy Sullivan

I found this interesting, to say the least...


The Hillary effect

Edward Klein's The Truth About Hillary: What She Knew, and How Far She'll Go to Become President is, even by the low standards of the genre, vile. In seeking to portray Hillary Clinton as a cold, manipulative woman who will do anything for power, Klein relies on wholly unsubstantiated accusations of corruption, lesbianism, and marital rape. Most conservatives who gleefully anticipated the book's release are now distancing themselves from it. And liberals have derived some joy from scenes such as right-wing talk show host Sean Hannity sharply questioning Klein over his use of sources.

Klein apparently didn't get the memo about anti-Hillary strategy. Frontal assaults and reckless accusations are sooo 1990s, definitely déclassé. More to the point, they make conservatives sound scary and are counterproductive. But while Democrats are surely hoping that these attacks will spur a backlash and sympathy for Clinton, the more likely outcome is a draw. Americans may have lost their appetite for books like Madame Hillary: The Dark Road to the White House and Hillary's Scheme: Inside the Next Clinton's Ruthless Agenda to Take the White House, but many of them share the underlying concern about Clinton's motives and character. Likewise, while a Republican nominee would benefit from anti-Hillary donations--in the last few months of the 2000 race, Lazio averaged $1 million each week in hard money contributions from Hillary-haters outside of New York--Sen. Clinton's prodigious fundraising has the potential to neutralize that effort.

Conservatives won't trot out supposed lesbian lovers in 2008; they'll go after her more subtly. They know that 40 percent of the country can't stand Sen. Clinton, another 40 percent adores her, and the remaining 20 percent (which, according to those recent polls, seem to feel generally positive about her) is made up of fairly soft support. The best way to turn that support into opposition is to voice those age-old questions about the Clintons: She's inappropriately power-hungry and ambitious--remember that Tammy Wynette crack? He lacks moral character--do you really want him roaming the White House again? And don't forget health care--who elected her to that post anyway?

Another golden oldie--the charge that the Clintons will say anything to get ahead--is already being revived elliptically by conservatives. The day after Sen. Clinton's news-making abortion speech this past January, conservatives were all over the media, charging that she was undergoing a "makeover" of her political image. "I think what we're seeing is, at least rhetorically, the attempt of the ultimate makeover," Gary Bauer told The Washington Times. Investors Business Daily editorialized: "When husband Bill did it, it was called triangulation.... Now another Clinton running for president is telling different audiences what they want to hear." In the six months since, the "makeover" charge has been repeated more than 100 times in the press. Give them another six, and "makeover" will be the new "flip-flop."

The target audience for these whispers and insinuations--and, let's not be naïve, occasional television commercials--is a familiar demographic: suburban women. Democrats lost ground in the 2004 elections among white, married, working women, and it's generally accepted that to win back the White House, the party needs a nominee who can appeal to these women. There's no reason to think that Republicans wouldn't revive the same kind of personal attacks that Lazio brought out in the last week of the 2000 campaign. In that race, the Hillary effect that resulted in the loss of suburban women was masked by gains among upstate men. She'll have a much harder time winning their counterparts in those essential swing states, which makes it even more important that she be able to count on the women's vote. If the Republican strategy in 2008 results in the same outcome as 2000--if, in other words, Clinton's advantage among women was half that of Gore's--the margin of victory in states like Iowa, Minnesota, New Mexico, and Wisconsin will disappear. Game, set, match.

No, Democrats, it's not fair. Hillary Clinton is smart, she's paving a promising new path for her party, she's a much better campaigner than anyone ever expected, and she's already survived more personal assaults than anyone should have to endure. But wishing the country would grow up and get over the 1990s already, that she could wage a campaign of issues and be evaluated on her political merit, won't make it so. What's more, those daydreams--pleasant as they are to contemplate on a sunny afternoon--cast a shadow over the Democratic field that makes it difficult for a potentially viable candidate to emerge.

It's too early for anyone to say with certainty that Hillary Clinton can't win the White House. But it's far too early--and dangerous--to conclude that she's the best chance that Democrats have.

* All credit for the above goes to Amy Sullivan, writer for the Washington Monthly.