News story: Hillary = DOOM FOR DEMOCRATS!

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GOP activists root for Clinton win

By: Jonathan Martin

August 26, 2007 07:35 PM EST

INDIANAPOLIS - He may be on his way out the door at 1600 Pennsylvania

Ave. in coming days. But the party Karl Rove has labored to build over

the past eight years seems to have picked up his talking points on

next year's presidential race: Hillary Rodham Clinton is going to be

the Democratic nominee and that could be the GOP's saving grace in an

otherwise uphill battle.

Conversations with Republicans gathered here for the biennial Midwest

Republican Leadership Conference reflect a party unenthused or just

plain uncertain about their potential White House nominee. But GOP

faithful also seem quite confident and even upbeat about the prospect

that the senator from New York is, as Rove put it, the "prohibitive

favorite to win the nomination."

That likelihood, they say, is good news for any hopes of keeping the

White House and getting other Republicans on the ballot elected.

Asked if Clinton being the nominee would improve his party's chances

both nationally and in Indiana, Howard County (Ind.) GOP Chair Craig

Dunn got excited. "Absolutely, absolutely!" he exclaimed animatedly,

grinning widely. "We've never elected a president of the United States

who started off with 45 percent unfavorable ratings!"

But from Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels on down to county chairs like

Dunn, Republicans also concede that they're still licking their wounds

from the losses that took place nearly 10 months ago.

"No, no, I don't think so," Daniels candidly replied Friday after a

kickoff luncheon when asked if the party had recovered from its dismal

midterm performance. As somebody who saw three Republican incumbent

congressmen in his state go down in defeat last fall and who faces a

potentially tough

reelection battle of his own next year, Daniels would know.

But Daniels, the budget director in President Bush's first term, said

there is reason for hope.

Acknowledging that any two-term presidency "leads to a natural

tendency to change," Daniels said he's nevertheless optimistic because

of the "array of fresh faces" running for the GOP nomination. "This

will not be a continuity candidacy. And I say this as somebody who has

served in this administration and is loyal to it. A continuity

candidacy, given the erosion in the party,

wouldn't have much of a chance."

Although he got behind Sen. John McCain early and still supports the

Arizonan (a longtime friend, Daniels repeatedly pointed out), the

governor said he doesn't know who the GOP nominee will be. "But our

party is going to present a new face, a new program, a new look to

America and it might just be one that is good enough to win."

And Republicans here are hopeful that they'll get to contrast that

fresh look with a Democrat who they think Americans will reject as

part of a checkered past and who can only boost their hopes to get

otherwise dispirited GOP activists to come out and vote.

It's why the focus on Clinton is so constant that it bordered on

obsessive in both the official sessions and less-formal corridor

conversations here.

In a multimedia presentation to the most diehard of GOP heartland

activists, RNC Chair Mike Duncan played and replayed a video of

Clinton talking about the economy in a manner he claimed smacked of

"socialism."

Duncan also offered barbs at Illinois Sen. Barack Obama and former

North Carolina Sen. John Edwards, among other Democrats - but as with

most of the Republicans here, the main target was clearly Clinton.So

when Duncan wrapped up his treatment of the Democratic presidential

hopefuls, it was only Clinton that he admonished for being "one of

only 22

senators to vote against [supreme Court Chief Justice] John Roberts"

and trying "to block" Samuel Alito's Supreme Court nomination. And

only she, as Duncan told it, "blasted the Supreme Court decision on

partial-birth abortion."

"It's amazing," Duncan concluded, "Hillary and her Democratic

competitors have made their position clear - they're running for

MoveOn[.org] and not for America."

The questions Duncan took from the audience reflect why Republicans so

want to make Clinton the center of attention; talking about the

current state of their own party is not nearly so much fun. Two of

those who raised their hands wanted to know when the party will get on

a unified message and one of

them expressed fear that the immigration issue (which Duncan pointedly

avoided during his presentation) will keep the GOP base home.

"My greatest fear is that they won't turn out," said the questioner.

Another wanted to know just what Bush's role will be in the election

(to which Duncan said in three different ways that the focus will be

on their nominee, not the outgoing president).

In an interview, an upbeat Duncan repeatedly came back to talking

about the opposition instead of his own party. "We've got to get back

to our basics," Duncan said. "Low taxes, less government, strong

national security."

"When we get our candidate, we'll be in good hands," he predicted. And

why? "Democrats are overplaying their hand."

Back in the conference room, it was much the same message. "As Hillary

Clinton becomes the nominee," projected GOP pollster B.J. Martino of

the Tarrance Group, pointing to charts and graphs, "Republican

intensity will simultaneously spike."

After a BBQ and fried chicken dinner at the famed speedway where

former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney enjoyed lusty applause and even

brought a few Republicans to their feet for offering his stock line

that Clinton "couldn't become elected president of France, let alone

president of the United

States," Republicans said they liked what they heard but were still

shopping for a candidate.

Asked which way she was leaning, one local Republican who didn't want

her name used hemmed and hawed before blurting out, "Anybody but

Hillary!"

Todd Rokita, Indiana's secretary of state and a Romney backer,

emphasized, given his is role as the state's election officer, that

the election next year would be fair and accurate. But as somebody

with further statewide ambitions, Rokita couldn't entirely hide his

delight at the prospect of a Clinton nomination. Hoosiers "have had

enough of the Clintons and they don't

want a return to that," he said.

But to Clinton's camp, the lavishing of GOP attention on the former

first lady is seen as nothing short of flattery.

Noting Clinton's uptick in both national and state polls, spokesman Mo

Elleithee said the GOP is "attacking her and making her center of

attention because they see these trends"

"They're starting to get a little nervous and are trying to stop her

momentum right now," Elleithee said. And he offered a reminder: Many

Republicans also once gleefully looked forward to taking on Clinton

when she first ran for the Senate in New York, too.