Inside Politics

Hillary’s psyche

“So what makes Mrs. Clinton run, even as her win-at-all-cost strategy threatens her party’s chances against John McCain, the Republican candidate?” Sally Bedell Smith asks in the Financial Times.

“The answer lies partly in her innately combative nature, the quality that drew Bill Clinton to her when ’she was in my face from the start.’ She is equally famous for a preternatural focus and what one of her friends called her ’tunnel vision,’ along with a determination so unshakeable that her husband once told a visitor to the Oval Office: ’I might as well try to lift that desk up and throw it through the window as to change her mind.’ To reach her goals, she long ago learned to embrace any tactic, however destructive. As her mother noted, Hillary does ’everything she has to do to get along and get ahead.’

“One of the most fascinating aspects of Mrs. Clinton’s tall tale about dodging snipers at Tuzla airport in Bosnia was her unwillingness to acknowledge that she had described her supposed derring-do to at least four audiences,” said Mrs. Smith, author of “For Love of Politics: Inside the Clinton White House.”

“This was no slip of the tongue created by sleep deprivation, as she claimed. Her capacity for self-delusion is nothing new. During the 1992 campaign, when ABC’s Sam Donaldson played audio tapes of Gennifer Flowers, her husband’s lover, saying ’Goodbye darling’ and Mr. Clinton replying ’Goodbye baby,’ her reaction was: ’Oh, that’s not true.’ ’Didn’t happen?’ Mr Donaldson pressed. ’Of course not,’ she replied.”

Bowling for votes

“For his first time running a $200 million corporation, Barack Obama has done a good job. No small vendors left behind in Iowa or New Hampshire with their bills unpaid, no newspaper stories about staff members screaming at one another, no having to lend the campaign cash to keep going,” Margaret Carlson writes at Bloomberg.com.

“Yet he’s made two big mistakes, and they are doozies,” Miss Carlson said.

“First, he didn’t see how regular folks who saw the videos of the Rev. Jeremiah Wright wouldn’t be able to get them out of their heads. …

“His second big mistake is bowling with others in Altoona, Pa. He ignored the risk every politician faces when trying to be one of the people if they’re not, a risk that doubles if you pursue the official state sport when you’ve never worn a league shirt with your name above the pocket.

“A savvy aide would have had Obama devote as much preparation to avoiding a 7-10 split as preparing for debates. Presidents know that if you aren’t sure you can get the first pitch from the mound across home plate, better to toss it (like a girl) from the bleachers.

“By now, as many people who will ever watch a candidate forum have likely seen Obama’s 37 score in a game that started with a gutter ball. He joked that an 8-year-old was giving him tips, but the reality is he didn’t even know how low a score it was. He should be grateful this wasn’t deer-hunting season.”

Pivotal state

“The end could be near,” USA Today reporter Susan Page writes from Raleigh, N.C.

“Or the endgame, at least, of a surprisingly drawn-out Democratic presidential contest. Four months and 42 states after the opening Iowa caucuses, the primary in North Carolina on May 6 now looms as a pivotal final showdown between Illinois Sen. Barack Obama and New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton,” the reporter said.

“Obama starts with a double-digit lead in polls here, a state where 2,400 free tickets to his rally at the War Memorial Auditorium in Greensboro last week were gone within three hours of the announcement he would appear. But Clinton has appeal in the Tar Heel State, too, and is competing hard. The day after Obama’s rally, she drew 1,000 supporters to the gym at Terry Sanford High School in Fayetteville for a town hall meeting.

” ’I really believe May 6 has the potential to be everything,’ says Joe Trippi, a strategist for the presidential bids of former North Carolina senator John Edwards this year and Howard Dean in 2004. ’Every day you see increased pressure on Hillary Clinton about why she’s staying in, and if she could win in North Carolina it would shut down that kind of talk and open up the possibility she could get there’ to the nomination.

” ’But if he wins in North Carolina,’ Trippi says of Obama, ’I think you’re going to see things close up very quickly. You’ll see a lot of superdelegates line up behind him.’ ”

Forgotten help

Many families of students in low-performing schools fail to take advantage of help offered to them under the No Child Left Behind law, according to an administration report.

Under the 2002 law, families whose children attend schools that consistently fail to meet the standards of No Child Left Behind are eligible to choose another public school or to access free after-school tutoring.

But the Education Department released a report yesterday that found that although the number of students participating in each option has indeed increased, many eligible families aren’t taking advantage of the options, reports Amy Fagan of The Washington Times.

In the 2004-05 school year, 1 percent of the nearly 6.2 million eligible students participated in the school choice option and 17 percent of the 1.8 million eligible students participated in the tutoring services option, the report found.

Supporters of the programs have said schools have done a poor job of getting the word out.

Fonda for Obama

“Jane Fonda, the actress and ardent anti-Vietnam war advocate who visited North Vietnam during those hostilities, has endorsed Democrat Barack Obama for president,” Andrew Malcolm writes at Weblogs.chicagotribune.com.

“There were no formal ceremonies for the endorsement. In fact, the Obama campaign may just be learning about the actress’s approval now as word spreads like lit gunpowder via the Internet,” Mr. Malcolm said.

“Fonda was eating out [Wednesday] night and exited the restaurant, ignoring as celebrities often do the assembled press contingent.

“But a video camera was rolling as she approached the street and someone, perhaps just trying to get her to turn around for a picture, shouted out at her back, ’Who are you going to vote for?’

“There was a moment of silence. Then, the actress did turn around toward the cameras, paused and with a smile said simply, ’Obama!’ Then she got into a car and drove away.”

• Greg Pierce can be reached at 202/636-3285 or gpierce@washingtontimes.com.