The Hillary candor, pander gap

Michael Goodwin:

Way back in 1992, when Hillary and Hubba Bubba first burst onto the national scene, many Americans expressed doubts about their honesty and integrity. Clintonesque, parsing, the definition of "is" - those and other phrases became polite shorthand ways of accusing a Clinton of lying.

Fast forward to last week, to fresh proof that the charge is still political dynamite. If Sen. Clinton loses the nomination because of the honesty gap, she can't say she wasn't warned.

Indeed, one of the mysteries of the Democratic race so far is why she fell into a predictable trap. She and her team, including the former President, are addicted to polls the way some people are addicted to crack. They had to see the red flags on basic character questions, yet they did nothing to confront them. And so Hillary has been Hillary, to a fault.

Now she is starting to pay the price. Winning the nomination, which seemed inevitable for nearly a year, is becoming a serious challenge. Suddenly, she looks neither invincible nor inevitable.

Polls that show Sen. Barack Obama picking up support at her expense in Iowa, New Hampshire and nationally perfectly illustrate Clinton's weakness. Asked which candidate is most honest and trustworthy, Clinton came in fourth in New Hampshire and third in Iowa. Only 13% rated her tops in that category in New Hampshire, with Obama getting 27% and both John Edwards and Bill Richardson doing better than her. In Iowa, Clinton got only 15% on the same question.

In both states, Obama gained ground she lost. He now leads for the first time in Iowa, 30% to her 26%, according to the ABC/Washington Post survey, with Edwards at 22%. And her 23-point lead in New Hampshire shrunk by 9 points in a month, according to the CNN/WMUR survey, which put her ahead by 36%-22% over Obama.

Given her relative strength across the board, the results hardly qualify as a great unraveling, but neither are they incidental. Less than a month after Obama and Edwards began making more direct attacks on her candor, cracks began showing. That's not a very long time under the gun to suffer such damage and the quick results will only encourage more attacks.

The cycle began in late October, when Obama, under pressure from his own supporters, said in an interview with The New York Times that "now is the time" to become more forceful in taking her on.

A few days later, in the Philadelphia debate of Oct. 30, he accused her of "changing positions whenever it's politically convenient," citing the North American Free Trade Agreement, torture and Iraq. "Now, that may be politically savvy, but I don't think that it offers the clear contrast that we need," he said. "I think what we need right now is honesty with the American people about where we would take the country."

The exchange set the tone for the debate, and the campaign ever since. Edwards also ratcheted up his attacks on her lack of candor and consistency. The approach hit the bull's-eye when Clinton lapsed into doublespeak on whether to give driver's licenses to illegal immigrants.

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The conflict here is one that the Democrat left has been pushing for some time. They want their candidate to be honest about being a liberal. The Clinton model, based on their experience in Arkansas and in the 90s believes that you cannot win as a liberal, so you have to finesse liberal issues but obfuscating and parsing.

They really try hard not to lie, but they are very clever about what they fail to disclose in hopes that they can get the wiggle room to sneak in more liberalism whenever possible.

What is interesting about this election is that they are being called on it by the left instead of the right. Many on the left are no longer willing to go along with the scam. If they succeed we can have a more honest debate on what direction we should take the country.