Republicans jump all over Hillary

Hillary's stumble at the end of the last debate was bad. Here's the Republican reaction:

WASHINGTON (AFP) — Suddenly, Republicans scent blood in the water, as a media storm rages over Democratic pace-setter Hillary Clinton's first stumbles of the 2008 White House race.

The New York senator's previously near-faultless campaign hit a hitch at a debate on Tuesday night, over her halting answers on illegal immigration, and the release of her papers dating from her husband's White House terms.

Republican White House hopefuls Rudolph Giuliani and Mitt Romney joined a feeding frenzy sparked by Democrats John Edwards and Barack Obama, hoping to please anti-Clinton conservatives and hurt a possible 2008 rival.

"I've seen Hillary, you know, do a southern accent in the South and talk like a New Yorker in New York and take two different positions on Iran and six different positions on Iraq," former New York mayor Giuliani told Fox News.

"But I never saw her take two different positions in one minute in front of the same audience."Romney also mocked her. "I watched her dancing around the issue. I thought I'd tuned to 'Dancing with the Stars,'" he said on Radio Iowa.

"She just wanted to have it both ways," said the ex-governor of Massachusetts, himself no stranger to charges of political reversals.

Hillary took two different positions on illegal immigration in one minute, yes. This makes her look silly, yes. But it's going to take more than that to move her poll numbers. People are not going to abandon her over one mistake.

Hillary better watch it though. The way these things build is through a totality impression, a host of things makes a candidate fit a certain image. Bush 41's playing golf with bad economic news being reported the same day, Gore's idiosyncratic debate performances, Kerry going windsurfing after he won the nomination. The blow of the last debate landed on Hillary, but there's another round, and she can absorb it by not goofing. Her last goof was right at the end. A two-hour debate; that's so fatiguing. I'm not blaming it on fatigue, I'm just pointing out how hard it is to run for president. She's the front-runner, so she has to be perfect.

Not goofing up is so hard, but it's required for a front-runner. This is why Richardson will never be the front-runner for more than a weekend.