Clinton is afraid of competition - Barack Obama is coming

The warm glow of party unity surrounding the Democrats in Washington is gone, chased away by Senator Hillary Clinton after last Monday’s CNN/YouTube “debate”. Why did she do it? Because she’s scared to death of Senator Barack Obama.

It started when they were both asked whether they would, in the first year of their administration, meet with the leaders of rogue nations. Senator Obama went first saying, “I would. The notion that somehow not talking to countries is punishment to them, which has been the guiding diplomatic principle of this administration, is ridiculous.” Senator Clinton came back with, “I will not promise to meet with the leaders of these countries during my first year. I will promise a very vigorous diplomatic effort. I don’t want to be used for propaganda purposes. I don’t want to make a situation even worse.”

Had it stopped there, it would have been a one-day story. But it didn’t. On Tuesday, Senator Clinton was in Iowa (where she’s nervous about trailing John Edwards) and broke the cardinal rule for front-runners: do not engage your opponents.

She was baited into it by a reporter saying that Senator Obama’s statement that the time to ask how we were going to get out of Iraq was before we got in meant he was suggesting she didn’t think enough about an exit strategy before her vote to authorize the use of force. And man did she ever take the bait. She responded with, “I would not vote that way were I to do it over again,” and the reporter had her on the defensive.

He pressed on, asking if her answer to the question about meeting with leaders of rogue nations was a reversal of her statement in April that she “thinks it’s a terrible mistake for our President to say he won’t talk to bad people.” She didn’t see it as a reversal and said Senator Obama’s response was, “irresponsible and, frankly, naïve.” It would be one thing if a campaign staffer made this statement, but when it comes from the candidate herself, it is a serious breach of protocol and a genuine escalation of rhetoric. Then it was on.

Senator Obama came back firing with both barrels on Wednesday saying, “if you want to talk about irresponsibility and naïveté, look at her vote to authorize George Bush to send our troops into Iraq without an exit plan and then asking the Pentagon about what the plan is five years later.” Then on Thursday, he drove the point home, burying Senator Clinton’s attempt to make hay out of all of this by saying, “I’m not afraid of losing the PR war to dictators, I’m not going to hide behind a bunch of rhetoric. I don’t want a continuation with Bush-Cheney. I don’t want Bush-Cheney light. I want a fundamental change.”

By then, Senator Clinton had clearly given up the fight and was trying to act like she didn’t start it by saying, “Well, this is getting kind of silly. I’ve been called a lot of things in my life but I’ve never been called George Bush or Dick Cheney certainly.” Then she tried to take another shot on the way out with, “We have to ask what’s ever happened to the politics of hope?”

There’s an expression we use on the block (in the ‘hood, around the way, whatever you want to call it) when someone starts something they can’t finish: we say “they don’t want none.” By the end of the week, Senator Obama knew Senator Clinton really didn’t want none, so he came back with, “The notion that we can’t have a substantive argument, or that I can’t challenge some of their conventional wisdom without somehow sacrificing the broader themes of our campaign – which is to bring people together and change the tone of politics – I think makes no sense.”

And with that, it was over. Senator Clinton had tried, and failed, to play up what she perceives to be her advantage over Senator Obama: her so-called experience. The only thing she succeeded in doing was to show that Senator Obama, a truly nice guy, is not to be trifled with. He took her best shot, blocked it with his gloves, dipped his shoulder, and counter-punched. And while neither of them is likely to deliver a knockout blow between now and Super Tuesday, Senator Clinton will certainly think twice about getting back in the ring with Senator Obama unless it’s really necessary. If she was afraid of him before last week (and clearly she was), she’s got to be petrified of a one-on-one debate with him now. She’s seen his punching power and she knows she doesn’t have the chin to take it.