The obstacles facing Clinton
AN UNDERDOG'S plight is always difficult at this stage in a campaign. Unlike the front-runner, who can sound unifying themes, underscore ideas of proven appeal, and command attention by sparring with the other side's likely nominee, the lagging candidate must scramble to show why he or she would make a better choice than the intra-party rival.
That's a difficult challenge under the best of circumstances. It means a candidate has to be on the attack, something that voters often find offputting, and which is even trickier for a woman.
But there's a more fundamental problem confronting Hillary Clinton: Obstacles from the past sit athwart the comeback route she's trying to navigate.
With Clinton facing make-or-break March 4 contests in Texas and Ohio, her campaign is striving to pump more voting-issue voltage into foreign policy and the economy in the belief that Clinton's greater Washington experience means both matters should work to her advantage.
"We need to raise the stakes," says one Clinton adviser.
That political imperative helps explain the foreign-policy speech Clinton delivered in Washington on Monday, as well as the "Economic Solutions Summit" she held in Ohio on Wednesday.
Billed as a major speech, Clinton's foreign policy address was largely a repackaging of her standard nostrums, plus a lengthy review of her experience in international affairs. Politically, it was most notable for the implicit comparison she drew between George W. Bush and Barack Obama.
"We've seen the tragic results of having a president who had neither the experience nor the wisdom to manage our foreign policy and safeguard our national security," Clinton said. "We can't let that happen again. America has already taken that chance one time too many."
In this case, the obstacle is as obvious as it is hulking: Her October 2002 vote for the Iraq war resolution.
Obama has long used that vote to argue that regardless of Clinton's years in Washington, he has displayed better foreign-policy judgment because, that same month, he spoke out against going to war.
During their Tuesday debate, Clinton tried yet again to dismiss his opposition as little more than one speech, saying that since coming to the Senate, Obama had voted the same way as she has on the war.
When she did, he pounced.
"Once we had driven the bus into the ditch, there were only so many ways we could get out," he said. "The question is, who's making the decision initially to drive the bus into the ditch? And the fact is that Senator Clinton often says that she is ready on day one, but in fact she was ready to give in to George Bush on day one on this critical issue."
Although Clinton's obstacle is less formidable on economics, it nevertheless remains sizable, particularly in struggling states: NAFTA. The mood among Democrats has clearly turned against trade pacts like the North American Free Trade Agreement. As this campaign has progressed, Clinton has toughened her rhetoric on trade, even declaring during Tuesday's debate that she had been "a critic of NAFTA from the very beginning."
But whatever her private misgivings, NAFTA is a fundamental part of her husband's legacy; further, her efforts to distance herself from the trade deal have run up against her own past comments praising it. Indeed, her recent anti-NAFTA rhetoric earned her a tough debate cross-examination from NBC's Tim Russert, who twice recounted some of her pro-NAFTA comments.
In comparison to the slippery going on those issues, Clinton has more traction on healthcare. Her plan, which includes a mandate that all adults have healthcare coverage, as well as subsidies to make insurance more affordable, has won good reviews from experts. Although Obama's plan would require that children be covered, he wouldn't require that adults purchase health insurance for themselves.
"Hillary's plan gets more respect from the health-policy world than does Obama's," says John McDonough, executive director of Health Care For All, a consumer health-advocacy organization. "If your goal is universal healthcare, then at some level there have to be mandates in the system. To say that you are going to do it in a voluntary way does not add up."
This is a matter Clinton obviously cares deeply about, and one she argues knowledgeably and well. Certainly it gave her some of her best moments in this week's debate, partly for this reason: Despite her unsuccessful 1994 healthcare battle, it's an issue where her past position reinforces, rather than undercuts, her current stand.
Scot Lehigh's e-mail address is lehigh@globe.com
