Clinton Ready For a Long Campaign
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- For over a week, the Hillary Clinton campaign has been telling reporters that they were expecting to do poorly in states like Washington, Nebraska and Louisiana, all of which she lost yesterday to Barack Obama.
Instead, the campaign has been putting emphasis on states like Ohio and Texas, which are two states that are chock full of delegates. The problem for Clinton is that Texas and Ohio don't vote until March 4th, and there are still more than 20 days and several large contests including Maryland, Virginia, Wisconsin and Hawaii that may favor Obama. When asked if Clinton can survive three weeks worth of losses, Senior Spokesman Doug Hattaway says, "Sure, we've planned for a long campaign."
Public perception aside, this will be a long campaign, where it's all about the delegate count and Clinton currently leads Obama by only six total delegates, according to CBS News' delegate count.
Both Ohio and Texas have hundreds of delegates combined, making them coveted states to win. So much so, that Clinton plans to be in Texas this Tuesday when the results of Maryland, Virginia and Washington, D.C. come in, opting out of hosting a victory party in any of those states, something she has done in other contests. Hattaway denies that they have discounted Tuesday's contests saying that they chose to be in Texas "because there is a lot of ground to cover and she wants to get to as many places as possible." Hattaway also pointed out that she and her family have several stops scheduled in Virginia, Maryland and D.C. today and tomorrow.
The Clinton campaign feels it may have a shot to compete in Virginia and Maine (whose caucuses are today), but the abbreviated schedule is forcing Clinton to focus more on drawing contrasts with her opponents rather than talking about policy, something Clinton favors and is often viewed as a strongpoint for her.
For example, during a dinner sponsored by the Virginia Democratic Party last night, where both Clinton and Obama spoke, Clinton took aim at her opponent despite the heavily pro-Obama crowd. Although Clinton never mentioned Obama by name, the swipes were obvious.
"Now I understand there are some people who say they can't tell the difference between me and George Bush, well I don't think there is any one here who believes the Republicans are confusing me and George Bush. And certainly, having fought George Bush everyday for the last seven years, I'll be among those most happy to finally see the moving van leaving the White House," Clinton said to some jeers in the crowd.
Clinton took another jab at Obama saying, "If I'm your nominee you'll never have to worry that I'll be knocked out of the ring, because I do have the strength and experience to lead this country and I'm ready to go toe-to-toe against Senator McCain whenever and wherever he desires."
The campaign has also focused its attention on attacking Republican Senator John McCain. During her speech last night, Clinton said that "President Bush has already put the stamp of approval on Senator McCain's conservative credentials, and I'm sure that will help."
Clinton chose not to congratulate or make mention of any of Obama's victories during her speech, instead her campaign hoped to shift the focus away from her losses to new fund-raising figures released by her campaign, which show Clinton has raised $10 million from 100,000 new donors since Super Tuesday.