Hendrik Hertzsberg, eulogizing Hillary Clinton's campaign:
Emphasis mine.
Maybe. Or maybe she didn't go negative early enough. For all of the media hand-wringing over her campaigns' attacks on Obama and her stupid pandering (both of which, I should say, I found shameful), she pretty thoroughly whipped him in most states that held primaries, which -- far more than the caucuses that Obama dominated -- favor the less politically engaged, who are the most likely to be persuaded by attacks and inconsistent messages. So maybe if she really wanted the nomination, she should have started smearing Obama from the get-go. Maybe she could have peeled away some of his support in Iowa, or really creamed him in New Hampshire, completely reversing his momentum instead of merely slowing him down until he could roll in South Carolina.
Regardless, the one mistake Clinton made that Hertzberg missed is that for almost a year, until January, Clinton campaigned like she was entitled to the nomination. She assumed she was going to steamroll, barely even campaigning in Iowa until it was too late. She was "inevitable," until she wasn't. She then adopted the "underdog" pose, fighting tooth and nail for every vote in the last half of the campaign. If she had scrapped like that for the first half, she might be the nominee.
http://www.stblogs.org/scgi-bin/mv/mt-tb.cgi/24222
