Hillary's headaches

What's the point in being up in every poll if it seems like the whole world is against you? No doubt something like that thought is endlessly coursing through Hillary Clinton's brain-what little part that retains any capacity for emotion.

It's been a rough couple of months for the 800-pound gorilla of Democratic politics. First, there were the Wall Street Journal's revelations about a family of six of modest means in Daly City, Calif. who had somehow cobbled together $45,000 in donations to New York's junior senator; their donations correlated strongly with those of another Clinton donor, Norman Hsu, the man behind some of her most public and successful fundraisers. What followed was a drama fit for daytime television as it emerged that Hsu was wanted in California (how California officials never noticed he was living it up in the Big Apple and raising vast sums for the Democratic Party is another question); the donor became a fugitive, only to be arrested a week later after what was apparently a failed suicide attempt.

Then there were the Los Angeles Times' revelations about the impoverished Asian immigrants-some of whom couldn't be located-working as dishwashers and street stall hawkers who had donated as much as $2,000 per person to the Clinton campaign. In addition to the obvious media scrutiny, the incidents put the infamously aggressive campaign on the defensive.

Things haven't gotten much better of late. Hillary has always held a peculiar place in American politics: She poses as a moderate (an act which fools almost no one), is universally despised by the right and is distrusted by many within her own party.

Much of this has become painfully obvious in recent weeks. She voted for a million-dollar earmark to a Woodstock memorial museum-and John McCain used it to his advantage ("I was tied up at the time"), simultaneously painting Clinton as a free-spending hippie and underscoring his heroism in Vietnam. She voted to label Iran's Revolutionary Guard a terrorist organization-calling a spade a spade, or, as the case may be, a terrorist a terrorist-and got slammed by the left wing of her party. She then promptly backpedaled, causing the rest of the country to scratch their heads.

The wheels really came off the wagon during last Tuesday's Democratic debate in Philadelphia. The whole event was more than a little reminiscent of a Cinco de Mayo party featuring Hillary the Human Piñata, as moderator Tim Russert more or less invited the other candidates to take a swing. The biggest short-term damage was John Edwards' attack on her Iran stance, which will hurt her among primary voters; long-term, her waffle on New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer's initiative to give driver's licenses to illegal aliens (she was for it before she wouldn't say whether or not she was for it) will likely come back to haunt her next November.

Because let's be honest here-Hillary's no ordinary candidate. She'll hang on and win her party's nomination. She's the Teflon Prima Donna. She's supported by one of the most disciplined and vicious campaign organizations in modern memory, has vast piles of cash and universal name recognition. And she still doesn't have any real competition within her party. John Edwards comes across as little more than a pretty-boy populist with an opportunistic self-loathing streak. Barack Obama has been flat and inoffensive-even his attempts at attacks seem half-hearted and ineffective. Dennis Kucinich admitted that he saw a UFO. Meet the Democratic Party.

But conventional wisdom to the contrary, winning the Democratic nomination isn't the same as winning the White House, Republican difficulties aside. Her private papers from her husband's administration are scheduled to become public early next year. The full depth of the Hsu scandal has not yet been determined; nor has her complicity in the matter. She's easy to paint as a flip-flopper and the scandals (personal and political) of her husband's administration may still have legs. Republican operatives may fear and loathe her, but they understand that she's vulnerable.