Clinton's Position Appears To Be Strengthening

[Herman Munster]

http://openleft.com/showDiary.do;jsessionid=55DD9198B7D1EC67AEBEA7D8DC55C677?diaryId=687

I point all of this out to make it as clear as possible that Hillary Clinton's lead is large, continuing to grow, and not in anyway similar to the advantages enjoyed by Lieberman and Gephardt in 2004. While both of them were consistently trending downward nationally and in Iowa respectively due to high, and not very favorable, name recognition among Democrats, Hillary Clinton is instead well-liked among the base and facing two high-name ID challengers in Edwards and Obama. It also does not appear that direct attacks on Hillary Clinton are working very well, since she trended noticeably upward during the foreign policy "spat" with Obama. Rather than the 2004 campaign, a much better analogy for Hillary Clinton's advantage is the 1984 and 2000 campaigns. Both of those campaigns featured former Democratic Vice-Presidents, which is basically what Hillary Clinton is for the rank and file right now. As Joe Trippi commented in my first post along these lines back in January:


Chris -- Her numbers are more like Vice President Mondale's in 1984 or even Vice President Al Gore's before the 2000 primaries. It will be very difficult to stop Hillary Clinton from gaining the nomination -- it can be done -- but not by any candidate who wages a "paint by the numbers" campaign. Gary Hart challenged Mondale and almost defeated him -- but he did it with a bold -- "New ideas" unorthodox campaign. In the end the machinery of the Mondale candidacy (full disclosure - I worked for Mondale that cycle) was too much for the Hart insurgency. If Hillary Clinton is defeated it will be by a bold, new, insurgent campaign.