A long slog of a debate on MSNBC tonight. One hackneyed cliche after another. Meanwhile the state of the Democratic race stays the same. Hillary kept her hawk’s eye on the general election by speaking a lot and saying as little as possible. She was adroit, practiced, and tremendously uncompelling. Never has a debate line been thrown away with less sincerity than Hillary saying that in the past she has made mistakes. She doesn’t believe one word of that. Hillary’s most truthful moment was obvious: Her steel-eyed “He’s not standing here right now” retort to moderator Russert’s crafty old (Bill) Clinton quote on the torture question. Hillary’s waited a lifetime to say that and has never meant any words any more than those.The others on stage were merely supporting players. Obama remains a thoroughbred on the campaign trail and a Shetland pony behind the debate podium. Richardson is stunningly incoherent. Edwards is cloying and smarmy, which ultimately might even work in a devastating final point of proof that this is indeed America’s last great decade. The rest don’t matter, although in a more just universe Biden should. You can feel the desperation of the minor leaguers building toward near madness as beltway talk has turned to Hillary’s “inevitability.” It seemed a few of the ham and eggers were barely controlling their dying pol’s primal urge to leap forward, put a death grip on the camera lens, and just keep talking and talking into it until either a poll number somewhere finally creeps up or a guard tasers them to get the camera back. “Inevitable” is the new “uncertain” in Democratic conventional wisdom these days, but assuming this race to be locked is beyond foolish. It is still far too early to tell and this tightly packed primary calendar is as unstable as nitroglycerin. Curiously, Das HillaryApparat has adopted an invincibility strategy. It seems a mistake to me. It raises Hillary’s expectations even higher than they already are. The only real benefit of being seen as invincible is that you hopefully choke off your opponent’s money and kill off their campaign before it can really begin. But Obama has money in the bank and a fierce fund-raising operation. He’ll have money. Edwards and Richardson are much more vulnerable. If Hillary chokes off Edwards’s money and his Iowa-based campaign collapses, where do the 25 percent of Iowa caucus voters currently supporting Edwards go? I think they will break heavily against Hillary and head straight to Obama or whoever the leading non-Hillary candidate is at that crucial window in late December. If that surge happens, Hillary probably loses the Iowa caucus and the whole master plan starts to quickly unwind. Careful with that smothering pillow, Mrs. Clinton. . . .
