With presidential field growing, is it too late for Clark?
Posted on Tuesday, January 23, 2007
WASHINGTON — The official entrances of New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton and New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson into the 2008 Democratic presidential race over the weekend increase pressure on Wesley Clark to decide his own plans, many political analysts and strategists believe.
He may be squeezed out already, they add.
There are only so many political operatives and field workers in key primary states — and only so much campaign cash — to go around. Those who are not already putting together their campaign organizations may find the gap impossible to close. And the front-loading of key Democratic primaries on the political calendar next year gives an advantage to those with well-developed organizations.
Clark, a retired general from Little Rock who was once NATO supreme allied commander, got into the 2004 race at what seemed like the last possible moment, largely at the urging of those who believed the party needed someone with strong foreign-policy credentials.
His campaign announcement came Sept. 17, 2003, so late that he made the tactical decision to forgo competing in the Iowa caucuses.
“He needs to make a go, no-go decision right now,” said Calvin Jillson, a political scientist and author at Southern Methodist University in Dallas.
Clark came out of the 2004 race viewed as an “honorable, credible candidate who misplayed his hand by getting in so late,” Jillson said.
When asked if he thought Clark was getting squeezed out, Erik Mullen, Clark’s spokesman in Washington, said in a statement, “General Clark is still working through his process. The makeup of the ballot is not a factor in his considerations.”
But Stephen Wayne, a professor, author and holder of the American Government Field Chair in the department of government at Georgetown University in Washington, D. C., said he does not see room for Clark in 2008. “He is too closely associated with the Clintons,” Wayne said.
Clark’s stint as NATO commander came during President Clinton’s second term, and many Clinton supporters drifted to his 2004 race.
Gary Jacobson, an author and professor of political science at the University of California at San Diego, said that “with [Illinois ’ Sen. Barack ] Obama and Hillary in, I don’t think there is room for anybody. It’s difficult to imagine someone without a political base, which [Clark ] doesn’t have, making a serious run.”
“There is not much oxygen [left for Clark ].”
Skip Rutherford, a Little Rock political analyst and director of the Clinton School of Public Service in Little Rock, said the primary schedule will definitely favor well-established organizations. But he said he had not studied it well enough yet to figure out which Democratic candidate would benefit most.
If California follows through on plans to move its Democratic primary up to Feb. 5, 2008, then that day effectively becomes a Super Tuesday, Rutherford said.
Whoever has the lead in delegates by then will likely be in an unbeatable position, he said.
Momentum-focusing caucuses or primaries in Iowa, Nevada, New Hampshire and South Carolina will be over by then, as well, he said.
“Clark has to hurry if he is going to build an organization in those states,” Wayne said.
Rutherford noted that Arkansas is also going to be in the mix of early primaries, making it interesting if both Sen. Clinton and Clark are competing.
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