Hillary survives her Perfect Storm, but battle is far from over
DAVE MCNEELY

Hillary could be forgiven in recent weeks for asking about the interruption to the Clintons' march back to the White House: What Happened?

The answer is, she was hit by an Obamanon - a seemingly perfect political storm, combining several different forces.

But when the flood waters receded after the March 4 presidential primary in Texas, she was still standing. She still trails Barack Obama in total delegates by about the same number as she did the day before, because of the proportional allocation that the Democrats use. But she echoed her husband Bill as The Comeback Kid of 1992, and regained some vital momentum against one of the most interesting political movements in a long time.

Clinton had dutifully gotten herself elected to the U.S. Senate from New York, just as her husband's presidential term was ending. Later she got on the Armed Services Committee, went to Iraq, and otherwise sought to prove she was tough enough to deserve to break through the glass ceiling to become America's first woman president.

But then came Barack - a crossover African-American version of what Henry Cisneros once represented for Mexican-Americans: an articulate minority politician with whom most whites feel comfortable. Born of a black Kenyan father and white American mother, raised primarily in Hawaii, law degree from Harvard, smart and dedicated.

Add to that his street-organizer message of hope, of bringing people together, that blew onto the national stage when he delivered the keynote address at the 2004 Democratic National Convention.

His message of change appealed to many Americans eager for a new direction, a more caring domestic approach, and a less belligerent face to the rest of the world. Obama could present a new, multi-ethnic face to America's relations with the rest of the world.

Interestingly, in 1992, when Hillary's husband was elected president, he was the change candidate: the young governor from Arkansas, the new face to Washington, a transitional political figure.

Sixteen years later, Hillary - wrongly or rightly - became identified with going back to something. The bridge to the past that Bill Clinton had hammered Republican nominee Bob Dole with in 1996. To the old ways of doing things, that had allowed the rise of people like Tom DeLay and Jack Abramoff. That everything has to be a pitched battle.

And the inevitability that the Clinton money machine was to provide for Hillary's presidential run, and seemed to for awhile, suddenly began to be outstripped by Obama's more adroit capitalization on the new power of the Internet, the horizontal means of political communication that allows a "Yes, We Can" movement to occur.

The young people he attracted understood these communications methods, and suddenly the do-good notion of having hundreds of thousands of small donors to politics took on the reality and power of a tsunami.

Obama's early opposition to the war in Iraq turned out to be a plus - that neither Hillary nor presumptive Republican nominee John McCain can claim. And he could, ironically, suggest that the nation needed a kinder, gentler government, albeit a firm one.

Obama won 11 straight contests after the Super Tuesday muddle, and she was on the defensive against this new wave.

But Austin adman Roy Spence dusted off the "fear" ad, the ringing red phone, that he'd used to help Walter Mondale stand off the new voice charge of Gary Hart. This time it was sleeping children: who do you want in charge when the White House phone rings at 3 a.m. with some world crisis?

Obama responded adroitly - that when Hillary had gotten the call about the war in Iraq, she'd voted to give President Bush the tools to declare it. But he was suddenly on the defensive in the experience versus freshness argument in the last few days before the vote.

One other thing: EMILY's List, which encourages women to run for office, gives money to women candidates, and votes. Exit polls showed women turned out in record numbers, making up 57 percent of the Texas vote.

So now, when many prognosticators had predicted that Hillary would be having to decide whether to concede the race, and Obama could be shifting his full attention to running against Republican nominee John McCain, she's got a new surge. The most interesting political primary face-off in decades isn't over yet.

- Contact McNeely at dmcneely@austin.rr.com.