More recently, her failure to answer substantive questions at a campaign stop in Miami in late February that media reports described as “stage managed” does not augur well for a presidential campaign (as president, Barack Obama appears wooden and devoid of emotion, but Candidate Obama was engaging and charismatic. Clinton is neither).
And the recent renaming of the Bill Clinton Foundation as the “Bill, Hilary and Chelsea Clinton Foundation,” seems to have been an opportunistic (there’s that word again) pre-campaign name change (could it also foreshadow a foray into politics by Chelsea?), more inspired by Hilary’s presidential hopes than deep passion about the Foundation’s worthy initiatives on women, kids issues and jobs
In short, Clinton is banking on the notion that the time is right for the American people to elect a woman president. She is probably right about that. But Clinton is never going to have a better shot at the Oval Office than 2008.
4. Stunning failure to understand politics
What? From the Clintons?
And yet, history suggests strongly that Clinton has made a fatal mistake (supported by her many friends in the media) by beginning her campaign too early. Conventional wisdom would suggest that Clinton has tried to keep her name in the public sphere while biding her time to formally announce a presidential bid, probably sometime in early-to-mid 2015.
But the 2008 candidacies of Newt Gingrich and Herman Cain, Ross Perot’s 1992 campaign and others suggest that the common comment made about American presidential campaigns – that they are simply too long – is true. Two years before the 1992 election, few people outside Arkansas had ever heard of Bill Clinton. George W. Bush did not become a serious contender for the Republican nomination until the primary season got under way in early 2000.
Here, too, I’m betting on an early peak-and-fizzle. Twenty-four-seven news cycle or no, I believe it will be impossible for her to “slowly build momentum” until the Democratic primaries begin in a year-and-a-half.
5. No habla Español
Clinton is correct that Barack Obama’s presidency destroyed the old template for US presidential elections – two homogeneous tickets comprised of four white men aged 45-60. But Clinton’s gender will not be sufficient qualification to secure the nomination, let alone election.
The 2016 election is likely to be the first in American history that is truly bi-lingual. More than 37.6 million Americans, more than 10 percent of the total US population today, now speak Spanish at home, according to a 2013 Pew Research Center survey. Twelve-and-a-half million of these people live in California alone, making up 30 percent of the electorate there. In seven states – California, Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Florida and New York – Spanish speakers make up significant portions of the electorate. Together, their voices add up to 167 electoral votes – more than half of the 270 needed to win the presidency.
This fact has not been lost on Republicans, who will have a wealth of Spanish speakers to choose from as the race gets underway. Senator Marco Rubio (R-Florida) and New Mexico Governor Susana Martinez are just two of the potential candidates with the ability to hit the campaign trail in Spanish and with inspiring rags-to-riches personal histories will resonate with voters and turn the campaign into a The Promise of America campaign.
Expect, then, for Spanish-language campaigning to become standard for both parties. That will put Clinton at an unsurmountable disadvantage against younger, bi-lingual Democratic challengers such as John Pérez, speaker of the California Senate and a veteran former union organiser. And even if she manages to win the Democratic nomination, her candidacy will pale in comparison to younger, bi-lingual, multicultural Republican ticket
