Running for history

There's an interesting line in the Washington Post's article about the presumptive race between Senator Barack Obama and Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton for the Democratic nomination for president:

"Senator Obama's got the magic, but Hillary Clinton's got the muscle," said Jamal Simmons, a Democratic strategist who is neutral in the nomination campaign. "This is going to be a titanic fight between energy and charisma on one hand and money and organization on the other."

It's interesting because four years ago at this time, Democrats were watching pretty much the same race between Howard Dean and John Kerry.

Yet Dean wound up with both the energy and the money, before Kerry outwitted him in Iowa and fed his self-destruction. Obama's a much more disciplined candidate than Dean; Clinton's got more star power than Kerry.

To the extent any argument you can make about Obama was also made about Dean--inexperience being the chief one--the fact that Dean overcame and indeed took advantage of all the rhetoric to become the overwhelming Democratic front-runner at one point bodes well for Obama.

That, plus the fact that all of Obama's forthcoming screw-ups will only feed into his image as an ordinary, likeable guy. Obama's about as close to bullet-proof as any candidate has been in recent years; well, except of course for the name-thing and the race-thing.

Just one sign of his popularity is his announcement of his candidacy, via his website, became--in just one day--one of the most popular items this month on Digg.

Hillary's chief danger is she is going to seem like old news compare to Obama; that everything she does or says, no matter its merits, can be tuned out by an electorate that may have hit historically high levels of cynicism when it comes to attitudes toward politicians.

Her top assets are she has a ton of money, and knows everybody there is to know. And a nearly-fanatically loyal and top-notch staff that's been helping her lay the groundwork for this run for the past decade.

Throw in the mantle of history both carry, and it's shaping up to be one heck of a race. With their contrasting styles, it may even turn out to be the most riveting thing on television this fall.

I don't see how this can be good for Republicans in any way--the country's gonna be riveted by all Democrats, all the time, for the next year-and-a-half. Whomever winds up being the nominee is going to have had a lot more free media on which to spread their message than anyone on the Republican side.

Then again, given the GOP's message is essentially whatever Bush says it is at this point, maybe it's not such a bad idea for them to lay low until they can sort things out.