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Press Coverage--2004 American Democracy Conference
The Journal News
Sen Clinton has early lead for 2008
By John Machacek
Journal News Washington Bureau
December 19, 2004
WASHINGTON ’Äî As many predicted, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton became the presumed front-runner for the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination the moment Sen. John Kerry lost his bid for the White House.
At least three polls since Election Day show the Chappaqua resident as an early favorite among Democratic and some independent voters.
Key Democrats say she and former President Clinton either individually or together represent the face of the party. And an online gambling site is offering 7-1 odds that Clinton has a better chance than others of being sworn in as president in four years.
Clinton's popularity among Democrats, her fund-raising prowess and a desire by some to see her as the first woman to become president all give her an advantage.
But Democratic strategists say it is far too early to anoint her or anyone else as a front-runner, especially while the party reassesses its strategy for winning national elections.
"I think the verdict is still out on Senator Clinton," said Steve Jarding, a Democratic consultant who is among those who think the party needs a new face and can't write off the conservative South as Kerry did. "Maybe that face is Hillary Clinton. But she has to step up to the plate and prove herself just like everybody else."
Democrats have little chance of recapturing the White House until they shed stereotypes that they are mainly urban liberals out of touch with family values and weak on national security, Jarding and others said at a recent conference hosted by the University of Virginia's Center for Politics. Jarding managed Democratic Gov. Mark Warner's successful Virginia campaign three years ago.
Although Clinton has tried to position herself as a centrist on defense and other issues, she still is perceived as a liberal icon and remains one of the most divisive figures in American politics.
Oklahoma Rep. Brad Carson, a middle-of-the-road Democrat, said a Republican TV ad blitz tying him to Clinton and Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., cost him a U.S. Senate seat in the November election. He lost to conservative Republican Tom Coburn in a race he led until mid-October.
Carson said voters who worried that Democrats might recapture control of the Senate told him, "We think you'll be a much better senator than Tom Coburn would be, but you are going to deliver the Senate into the hands of Ted Kennedy and Hillary Clinton, and we can't have that happen."
Clinton says she is set to run for re-election in 2006 but dodges questions about her presidential ambitions.
However, she agrees that Democrats need to take a hard look at what they stand for, do a better job of communicating their message on social values and defense, and nominate a 2008 candidate who won't ignore any part of the country.
She cites her work as a New York senator as a model of how to represent and reach Republicans and Democrats.
"I don't accept the fact that it is red (Republican states) vs. blue (Democratic states)," she said last month on CNN's "Larry King Live."
"Forty counties in New York voted for President Bush this time. You know I work as hard as I can in every single county in the state. I try to represent everybody to the best of my ability."
Clinton has worked with conservative Republicans in the Senate on such issues as education, health care and homeland security. She also has taken a hard stance against illegal immigration ’Äî a position some feel will help her attract support from conservative voters.
But Clinton says she won't abandon her sharp attacks on Bush's fiscal policies.
Clinton has made inroads in New York, gradually winning over most of the voters who initially didn't know how they felt about her.
Her approval rating has jumped from 38 percent when she took office nearly four years ago to 63 percent this month, according to a Quinnipiac University poll.
Still, Clinton remains a divisive figure nationally. Nearly 40 percent of Americans disapprove of her, according to a CNN-USA Today-Gallup Poll last summer.
Another Quinnipiac poll suggests that Clinton could do better than expected in swing states in a presidential race. In the survey of 1,039 registered voters in Florida, 45 percent said they would like to see her run for president in 2008 compared with 36 percent for 2004 Democratic vice presidential nominee John Edwards.
"The anti-Hillary faction is not as large as some conventional wisdom believes it is," said Clay Richards, assistant director of Quinnipiac polling. "The fact that she gets 20 percent of the Republican vote (in the poll) indicates to me that she is not necessarily seen as a New York liberal."
Clinton's biggest obstacles as a potential presidential candidate are much like the ones that faced Kerry or other senators who have run for president in recent decades. No U.S. senator or Northeasterner from either party has won the presidency since John F. Kennedy in 1960.
Clinton also would face the challenge of trying to become the first woman president, and she would be doing it when the nation still is jittery about terrorism.
Some suggest that Clinton could use her seat on the Senate Armed Services Committee to make the case that she can keep the country safe. That committee assignment already has landed her a place on a Pentagon panel that advises the U.S. Joint Forces Command on how to make the military more efficient.
The first hurdle between now and 2008 is one Clinton has set for herself: running for a second Senate term.
New York Republicans are looking for a big name to run against her.
Former New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani has been mentioned but does not appear eager to take her on. Gov. George Pataki and outgoing Secretary of State Colin Powell have indicated they are unlikely to run.
2004 American Democracy Conference Home
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Copyright © 2004 U.Va. Center for Politics. All rights reserved.
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