It's All in the Details

As many suspected, Obama took Hawaii and Wisconsin. (And McCain took Washington and Wisconsin—see I give equal time!) What does this mean? I think it means that Clinton is in some serious trouble. But like her husband, being behind has suited her in the past. I don't think you can rule her out completely. But we can re-visit this conversation on March 5, after the primaries in Ohio and Texas. Those will surely determine Clinton's fate.

Of course, Clinton is already trying to fight back. Her speech after the announcements last night was heavy on the idea that Obama is about words and not actions. In a moment of prescience, Obama gave his longest victory speech yet (pundits clocked it at 45 minutes) and went into more details about things he would do as president in terms of policy.

It's a nice start, but he has got to step it up. A fine example of this is the recent beef recall. Clinton sent out a press release with a detailed, but perhaps not complete, list of things she would do as president to insure the safety of our food. (For those of you who don't know, some of the tainted meat apparently went to schools where it has already been consumed. Not good.) Obama issued a release as well, but it was far from as comprehensive as Clinton's and was really a mere statement. Dude that isn't going to cut it.

Listen, I get that Obama is most exciting when he uses speeches to fire up the masses and fill them with his special brand of hope. I am as much of a sucker for it as the next person. But as I have said repeatedly, he is going to have to start backing that up with some solid plans. No matter if Clinton or Obama gets the nomination and wins, we will be better off as a nation with either one of them running the country than we would be with McCain. Sorry, it is just what I believe. At the same time, I don't want the nomination to go to Obama and then have him decide to trot out his policies and Americans feel hoodwinked.