Boston Globe: Her first steps set stage for fall
Campaign wasted momentum, money, analysts say
By Susan Milligan, Globe Staff | June 4, 2008
....(F)ew at that time expected that Obama would overcome the political and financial head start the wife of the former president appeared to have at that phase of the campaign, even though Obama had already drawn exuberant crowds in early primary states. But Penn's offhand remark reveals the mistakes made by a Clinton campaign that failed to take Obama's candidacy - or his supporters - seriously enough at the outset, and did not prepare for the long-haul fight Obama was ready to wage for the nomination, according to political specialists.....
The decision to stress her experience and stature in the party played directly into Obama's plan to portray her as too tied to the system.
Meanwhile, her decision to spend most of her war chest early, hoping to knock out rivals in the first primaries, left her ill prepared for a long campaign. "They never saw this coming," said Steve Rabinowitz, a veteran of Bill Clinton's 1992 campaign who was sympathetic to Hillary Clinton's candidacy. Certain that the nomination would be virtually sewn up early, "they literally ignored everything except New Hampshire, and to a tiny extent, South Carolina. There was never any catching up," Rabinowitz said.
She spent heavily on a paid staff of more than 350 people last summer and doled out more than $1.3 million to 10 types of consultants to guide her on such campaign tasks as media relations, fund-raising, and voter outreach. Her campaign staff deluged media in-boxes with lopsided polling numbers showing an easy path to the nomination, creating sky-high expectations that were quickly dashed when the voting started....She did little to dispel the idea put forward by many media organizations that she was the front-runner, even though many months remained before a single caucus or primary vote would be cast....
...(A)s Clinton was reveling in the excitement surrounding her historic candidacy, Obama, too, was hard at work. He drew equally large crowds in New Hampshire - especially from young people, who would become not only a critical part of Obama's expanding base but a key source of the party's growing registration numbers. And while the Clinton campaign was brushing off Obama's rock-star reception as a temporary flirtation among a minority of Democrats attracted to a new face in politics, Obama was using the Internet to build networks of staff and volunteers across the country. He anticipated contests well beyond the first few primaries and caucuses that Clinton supporters believed would settle the nomination early.
In effect, her strategy was built on the premise that the nomination was hers to lose....The plan backfired - badly....
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2008/06/04/her_first_steps_set_stage_for_fall?mode=PF
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