Reading the Shrum book, and reliving the 2004 Democratic primary, I’m wondering if we’ll see a similar dynamic among the Big Three Democrats in 2004.
Hillary as John Kerry: The establishment candidate, which has its advantages and disadvantages. With Hillary more disciplined and careful than Kerry, her strategy could and should be fairly simple: Don’t make mistakes, and aim for a big win early to confirm the sense of inevitability. As we saw with Kerry, winning begets winning; if Hillary wins Iowa, it’s tough, though not impossible, to see her doing badly in New Hampshire. If she wins one or both of the first two, she should be in position to do well on Super Duper Mega Tuesday, and from there cruise to the nomination…
Obama as Edwards: This line by Shrum discussing Edwards’ 2004 run reminded me of Democrats’ attitude towards Obama today: “Early on, Edwards trounced [the Kerry campaign] in South Carolina, and not just because of his southern appeal. It was increasingly clear that Democrats genuinely liked him. What was holding them back was the fear that as a one-term senator, he just wasn’t ready for the presidency, and couldn’t win it in an election dominated by 9/11 and the war in Iraq.”
Obama is running a very good campaign so far, giving Hillary a much tougher race than many expected. But she’s still the frontrunner, and pleasant rhetoric about audacious hope and charisma won’t be enough to overtake her unless she unexpectedly stumbles. I don’t think Obama will “pull back” the way Edwards did when it became a two-man race between him and Kerry. (I don’t think Obama is interested in the vice-presidency, and I don’t think Hillary would choose him.) But he needs some sort of bulletproof argument that he’s not just good, but better than her for Democrats, and it’s got to be more than a speech on Iraq back in 2002. I think his relative youth is working against him, in that he needs to be able to say “my time is now, not four or eight years from now.”
Edwards as Howard Dean/Richard Gephardt: Here’s where things get interesting. In 2004, one of the factors that sunk Dean – even before “YEARRRGH!” – was the fear that he couldn’t beat Bush. If the Democrats feel confident about their chances in 2008 – and with the GOP tearing itself apart over immigration, why not? – then Edwards might be in the best position to say: Why not nominate the candidate with the positions you really want? No triangulation, no moderation, no compromise: The most unrefined, but electable liberal in the field, the Democrat who represents the Democratic wing of the Democratic Party.
His wife has cancer. It’s hard to see him returning to the political world if he loses. He’s already been on a ticket that comparably played it safe.It’s now or never for him; he can offer Democratic primary voters a sense of throwing caution to the wind and going all-out for their policy goals. He may benefit from a sense of “buyer’s remorse” over Kerry, the sense that the party played it safe in 2004, and ended up losing anyway…
On the other hand, people are joking that Edwards has practically moved to Iowa. If Edwards somehow does badly in Iowa, it would probably be almost as damaging to his campaign as the fourth-place finish was for Gephardt.