The Maverick Tribe

Why do I think it's going to be Hillary?  It's the organization, stupid.  She has the most effective, cautious, deliberate, disciplined machine of a campaign one could ask for.  It's wincingly fake at times, but terribly effective.  Arguably the best politician in modern America is married to her.  Everything that is done and said by her campaign seems to produce the intended result.  She outshines everyone at the debates by sheer preparation and calculation.  She's going to bury her Democratic competition handily in the primaries and go on to win an (albeit tough) fight in the general election.  The Republican field, by contrast, seems somewhat disorganized and inconsistent.  It is still unclear who the strongest candidate on that side is.  All have grave weaknesses.  (Hillary's got some major weaknesses as well, but she will overcome them through sheer smarts and hard work.)

Hillary Clinton's ride to the presidency is going to be annoying.  The woman seems incapable of answering a question directly, always shifting to her carefully planned talking points.  As just an example, here's how she answered a softball from George Stephanopoulos on ABC's This Week last week:

GS:  You've seen the presidency from a perspecive unlike any first time candidate ever in American history, up close unlike any first time candidacy in presidential history, so you know a lot about being president.  But what is something that you don't know, that only a president can know?

HC:  Well, George, as you have just said, I've seen the presidency in a very- in a front row seat on "History Way", and I know how hard this job is.  And you know, you can read books about it, you can think hard about it, and of course people running for president do.  But it is hard to be prepared for the pressure cooker that the American presidency is today.  We have only one person in our country who represents both our state and our government - most countries divide those responsibilities - so you're the symbolic head of state and you're running the government.  And every single day that goes by the pressures increase, with the 24/7 media environment, with all of the advances in communications.  You have to be grounded, you have to know what you believe, you have to be guided by what you think are the right principles for your country, but there is still no predicting what is going to happen on your watch.  And, you know, I know how hard it is, and I think following President Bush with some of the problems we have will make it especially hard, but I'm also confident and optimistic that our country can rise to this challenge.  I wouldn't be running if I didn't think that I was the person at this point in our history who could summon that extraordinary resilience and commitment from America again, and I think that we will be able to start both repairing the damage, but more importantly, starting to act like Americans -  solving our problems, restoring our leadership in the world, and that's what I look forward to.

Huh?

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