Democrats toughness debate no contest

Kirsten Powers:

IT's starting to look like a "toughness gap."

His chant: "Yes, we can." Her chant: "Yes, we will."

Obama likes to say, "I may be skinny, but I'm tough." Hillary throws back shots and threatens to obliterate Iran.

He complains about tough questions from George Stephanopoulos and Charlie Gibson. She sits down with Bill O'Reilly.

A Fox News poll released Wednesday found that 61 percent of Democrats describe Clinton as "tough," but only 23 percent say that about Obama.

The boys are swooning. The president of an Indiana steelworkers local union introduced Clinton as the "individual with [the] testicular fortitude" to deal with the nation's problems.

In his endorsement of Clinton, North Carolina Gov. Mike Easley enthused, "This lady right here makes Rocky Balboa look like a pansy." In an ad, the governor gushes more: "She is so resilient, so determined. She knows how to deliver."

Or, as Clinton said in a World Wrestling Entertainment promo: "The last man standing may just be a woman."

Ouch.

After the ABC debate, National Review Online's Jim Geraghty wrote of her: "I like the cut of your jib, senator. It's like watching a linebacker perfectly execute a blitz and flatten a quarterback from the blind side. It's brutal, and tough to watch when it's your guy being hit, but it's within the rules and almost artistic when it's perfectly executed."

That debate was Clinton's pièce de résistance. After enduring calls for her to drop out, superdelegate defections, money problems, ridicule by the media and a staff shakeup, she showed up looking and acting like she just got back from a spa vacation. Obama, nearly 15 years her junior, looked exhausted and rattled.

...

Hillary's problem is many Democrats want a wimp. MoveOn certainly does. At least they want a foreign policy wimp. Politically when it comes to beating up on republicans they prefer a bully. They think they have their guy in Obama, and the establishment is weaseling its way toward him.