Hillary on track

Tony Blankley expresses my view of the dynamics in the competition for the Democratic Party presidential nomination:

With every passing week it becomes more likely that Hillary Clinton will be the Democratic Party nominee for president. This thought, alone, should provide the strongest possible motivation to the Bush administration and the Washington Republicans to get their acts together so that the eventual Republican nominee for president doesn’t start the general election campaign in too deep a hole.

Blankley also expresses my view of the challenge she presents to Republicans as a presidential candidate:

The polls that show half the country saying they won’t vote for Hillary should be discounted. At the election, the choice will not be Hillary or not Hillary — it will be Hillary or someone else. And that is what the campaign is about.

I’ve thought since before Barack Obama became a presidential candidate himself that the Democrats’ 2008 ticket would be Clinton-Obama. Whoever is at the bottom of the Democratic ticket, however, the ticket will be formidable. What state that John Kerry carried against President Bush in 2004 will Hillary Clinton lose to any hypothetical Republican nominee in 2008? And the Democratic nominee can realistically look to pick up states including Ohio, Missouri, Iowa, and New Mexico, among other states. Like the prospect of being hanged in a fortnight, in Samuel Johnson’s formulation, the prospect of Hillary Clinton as the Democratic nominee concentrates the Republican mind wonderfully.
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