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March 19, 2010
Rabbi Berel Wein: The Divine is in the details
JWisdom.com Stewards of sacrifice with Rabbi Sroy Levitansky (5 minutes)
Caroline B. Glick: Why Obama is waging war on Israel
March 18, 2010
Cal Thomas: Israel's New Enemy: America?
JWisdom.com Love me not? with Rabbi David Aaron (5 minutes)
Jonathan Rosenblum: Washington Throws a Tantrum
March 17, 2010
Rabbi Yonason Goldson: Orwell, Santayana, and Me
Jonathan Tobin: How Many Lives Is Biden's Pride Worth?
March 16, 2010
Steven Emerson: Combating Lawfare
JWisdom.com How to perform a miracle with Rabbi Yaakov Asher Sinclair (4 minutes)
Anne Bayefsky: Behind Obama's Dangerous Overreaction on Israel
March 15, 2010
The Jewish Ethicist By Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Father's obligations toward minor children
JWisdom.com Moody, Grumpy, Irritable Children with Sarah Chana Radcliffe (5 minutes)
Judith Graham: Get the whole picture before a CT
March 12, 2010
Rabbi David Aaron: You CAN have Heaven on Earth
JWisdom.com Manufacturing mediums with Rabbi Sroy Levitansky (4 minutes)
Caroline B. Glick: The march of the Red-Green brigades
March 11, 2010
Glenn Garvin: Conspiracy theories, why people believe them and how they spread
JWisdom.com For Yourself, Not By Yourself with Rabbi Lawrence Hajioff (8 minutes)
The Kosher Gourmet by Linda Gassenheimer : Turn leftovers into tasty New England hash
Paul Richter: Biden promises 'viable Palestine' is in the offing
March 10, 2010
Paul Greenberg: Death Checks In
JWisdom.com How To Get A (Real) Life with Rabbi Warren Goldstein ( EXTENDED EPISODE)
Paul Richter: Israel exerts soverign right to its capital as Biden looks on astounded
Richard A. Serrano: 'Jihad Jane' indictment alleges threat from within U.S.
March 9, 2010
Wesley Pruden: Joe's Israeli adventure
JWisdom.com Free To Be (Responsibly) You and Me! with Rabbi Naftali Brawer ( 8 MINUTES)
David G. Savage: Supreme Court to rule on free speech in case of soldier's funeral
March 8, 2010
The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Make a fuss about those who cuss?
JWisdom.com Finding or Losing Yourself? Here's How! with Rabbi David Aaron ( 5 MINUTES)
Steven Emerson: America must learn from the UK about the future of Islamist subversion
March 5, 2010
Rabbi Berel Wein: Golden Calf still with us --- except it has multiplied
JWisdom.com The Limits of Eternity with Rabbi Sroy Levitansky ( 4 MINUTES)
Caroline B. Glick: Biden's lost cause
March 4, 2010
Alan M. Dershowitz: How About A Real Campaign Against Abuses?
JWisdom.com Using Things, Loving People with Rabbi Lawrence Hajioff ( 7 MINUTES)
Jordan "Gorf" Gorfinkel's Everything's Relative
March 3, 2010
JWisdom.com Grasping The Name of Your Life Game with Rabbi Warren Goldstein ( 8 MINUTES)
The Kosher Gourmet by Marialisa Calta : A cowboy's recipes for really good grub
March 2, 2010
Rabbi Avi Shafran: Someone's there
Diane Toroian Keaggy : Have we misunderstood Michelangelo?
March 1, 2010
JWisdom.com Whole in One with Rabbi David Aaron ( 5 MINUTES)
Michael Muskal: Hillary meets with Israeli official, discusses gefilte fish dispute
Feb. 26, 2010
Rabbi Francis Nataf: The Megilla of Spring
JWisdom.com A Biblical Secret for a More Powerful You with Rabbi Sroy Levitansky ( 5 MINUTES)
Caroline B. Glick: When rhetoric rules the roost
Feb. 25, 2010
The Jewish Ethicist By Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: When walking away from your mortgage is both economically sound and makes ethical sense
JWisdom.com The Second Most Important Question in Your Life with Rabbi Yehoshua Karsh ( 5 MINUTES)
Seema Mehta : U.S.-Israel relations raised in California's Senate race --- by conservatives
Feb. 24, 2010
Rabbi Avi Shafran: The gift of the ‘prayer bomber’
Steven Emerson: Why Religious Freedom Commission is under attack
Feb. 23, 2010
Dennis Prager: Government, Yes! The Divine and Parents, No!
JWisdom.com The Last Laugh of Enlightenment with Rabbi Yaakov Asher Sinclair ( 5 MINUTES)
Anne Applebaum: Prepare for war with Iran --- in case Israel strikes
Feb. 22, 2010
Rabbi Yonason Goldson: Is it not refreshing Tiger Woods' career has crashed and burned so dramatically?
JWisdom.com Esther and the third Truth with Rabbi David Aaron ( 9 MINUTES)
Kelly Brewington: Going smoke-free may raise diabetes risk
Feb. 19, 2010
Rabbi David Aaron: Is the Divine beyond us or within us?
JWisdom.com Olympic Faith with Rabbi Sroy Levitansky ( 5 MINUTES)
Caroline B. Glick: Israel and the West are perpetrators of a myth that endangers the Jewish State
Feb. 18, 2010
Cal Thomas: Who is Rashad Hussain?
JWisdom.com A Wedding Disaster to Remember with Rabbi Y.Y. Rubinstein ( 3 MINUTES)
Feb. 17, 2010
JWisdom.com Think your life is messed up? with Rabbi David Aaron ( 11 MINUTES)
Greg Logan: 'Greatest Jewish sporting event of all time since David versus Goliath' may be postponed because of bar mitzvah
Feb. 16, 2010
Anya Martin : Boy's 'cerebral palsy' fixed with diet
JWisdom.com Feet On The Street Spirituality with Gavriel Aryeh Sanders ( 8 MINUTES)
Marty Peretz: Let Europe Mind Its Own Business. It Brings Nothing To The Table Save For Mischief
Feb. 15, 2010
Herb Geduld: Lincoln and the Jews
JWisdom.com Are Our Children Really Ours? with Rabbi Mordechai Becher ( 5 MINUTES)
Susan King: 'Wolf Man' reflected writer's wartime Jewish experience

Jewish World Review Jan. 8, 2007 / 18 Teves, 5767

Is Hillary showing her age?

By Dick Morris & Eileen Mc Gann


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http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | The smartest thing George W. Bush did as he pursued the presidency in 2000 was to jettison his father's former campaign team and start his own bid for the White House from scratch. He realized that times had changed in the 12 years that had elapsed since his Dad was elected, and that the old guard would be set in the old ways. So, he reached out for new people with new ideas - people Dad hadn't known well back in 1988, like Karl Rove and Karen Hughes - to pilot him to victory in 2000.


But that's not the model that the next heir apparent has chosen.


Hillary Clinton now seems wed not just to the 1992 candidate himself, but to his staff, advisors, supporters, tactics, strategy, and timing as well. As this nearly 60 year old candidate faces younger and savvy challengers in Barak Obama, 45, and John Edwards, 53, she seems to be showing her age rather than grasping just how much the political world has changed since she last trod the presidential campaign trail.


According to recent news articles, she apparently seemed genuinely surprised that the 2008 presidential race has heated up so early. (Wake up Hillary!) Evidently, she's been grousing to potential supporters that she doesn't understand why she can't follow the more leisurely schedule her husband first pursued, when he waited to announce his candidacy until the fall of 1991. Her plan was to do the same thing. Now, with the increasing strength of Edwards and Obama, she's being forced to get into the race and compete. This was something that she hadn't planned on; not at all.


With Hillary's coy insistence for the past year that she hadn't made up her mind about whether to run for president, she could hardly start publicly campaigning. But while she was playing dumb about her candidacy, Edwards was cleverly and effectively building the support of Democrats in Iowa, South Carolina and New Hampshire - the early primary states. Now Edwards is in first place in Iowa and Hillary is in fourth. He's tirelessly crisscrossing the state. She hasn't been there in years. There's a lesson there.


Hillary appears to have been completely taken by surprise by the boomlet for Obama. He's now tied with her in New Hampshire and ahead of her in Iowa. The Obama phenomenon quickly knocked her out of her complacency. Suddenly, just days after the New York Senate election, she began to frantically invite prominent Democratic Party types from Iowa and New Hampshire to her home for dinner to discuss her 'potential' presidential race. Using her BlackBerry - or more likely the old Clinton Rolodex, - she contacted the party hacks from 10 years ago…the people who supported Bill back then. It's been a long time since she last visited New Hampshire, and she hasn't kept up with the changes in the Party. She's relying on the outdated Clinton contacts, even ignoring the first female Speaker of the House, who was also the first Democrat elected Speaker in 70 years. That's someone to pay attention to.


Everything about the Hillary operation looks a bit out of date. Most of her advisors are the same retreads the Clintons have always used. They resemble nothing so much as the aging Camelot crowd that surrounded JFK and Bobby, and reassembled tiredly to help Teddy mess up his race in 1980.


The top echelon of Hillary's brain trust is the same old White House gang that advised them many years ago. As part of her offense after the election, Hillary even had a highly publicized dinner with former advisers James Carville and Paul Begala (wonder how the press ever learned of that rendezvous). Their last presidential campaign was Bill Clinton's 1992 race 14 years ago - hardly the place to go for cutting edge political advice. Even the Clintons declined to hire that undynamic duo for the 1996 race or for either of Hillary's Senate race. Gore ignored them in 2000 and Kerry refused to hire them in 2004. Hillary won't hire them either, but she still looks backward. Maybe the nostalgia is comforting to her.


It's déjà vu all over again.


Hillary's tactics are also old. She spent much of her $40 million campaign war chest in her 2006 run for a second term in New York building her direct mail list. Direct mail? Hello?? Ever heard of the Internet? No up-front costs, no turnaround time, rapid contacting, etc.


And last year, Hillary quaintly called for a post card writing campaign to lobby for maintaining Homeland Security funding levels in New York. Again, ever heard of the Internet, Hillary? Post card campaigns went out with the mimeograph machine.


Sen. Clinton reportedly hopes that her meetings and the discussions about her candidacy will remain secret, drawing around herself the same veil of privacy she used to shroud the operations of the White House Health Care Task Force from public view in 1993. Hey, wake up! Those days are over. Nothing in a presidential race is kept secret.


Today's politics is a whole new world. Money is raised by the bushel and, as a result, is no longer as decisive. Events happen faster. People seek out candidates before they have the time to reveal themselves to the voters. A candidate herself, actually, controls only about a quarter to a third of her own campaign. Bloggers, Internet e-mailers, independent expenditures, party committees, eager contributors and special interests run the rest for her. She can't keep track of her own campaign, let alone control it.


Unless Mrs. Clinton takes a crash course in the new politics, she's not going anywhere. These old days are over, Hillary.

Every weekday JewishWorldReview.com publishes what many in in the media and Washington consider "must-reading". Sign up for the daily JWR update. It's free. Just click here.


JWR contributor Dick Morris is author, most recently, of "Because He Could". (Click HERE to purchase. Sales help fund JWR.) Comment by clicking here.



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