RALEIGH – John Edwards and Rudy Giuliani are both smart, accomplished attorneys. Neither is going to be president of the United States. But on the question of how their respective 2008 nomination battles were going to unfold, Edwards had the right answer and Giuliani had the wrong one.
Edwards was right, years ago, to recognize the vulnerability of Hillary Clinton in a spirited Democratic primary. He correctly saw political room to her Left, on the war and other issues, as well as the very real existence of Clinton fatigue among many Democrats. It’s not that Democratic base voters are necessarily hostile to the Clintons – though the former president has been doing his part in the past couple of weeks to earn some – but there is a yearning for a fresh face, a new start.
This is present across the spectrum, by the way. Does anyone really want to have a Bush or a Clinton as our president for 24 years straight, or 28 if Hillary won a second term? Ugh.
The problem for Edwards was that the former high-school football standout correctly spotted an opening in the Clinton defensive line but proved to be both less fleet of foot and less imposing in (political) stature than the other runner in the backfield, Barack Obama. While Edwards continued to be an able campaigner, he simply never had the star quality or compelling personal narrative of Obama. Putting his faith in the electoral heft of organized labor and anti-poverty groups, Edwards failed to capture the imagination of upscale liberals who supply a large hunk of the campaign cash and elite influence within the party, nor was he as likely to pull support from the Clintons among black voters or the moderate, business-oriented “Clinton Democrats” of the 1990s.
It’s cold consolation, I’m sure, for the Edwards team to conclude that they were right about the strategy but lacked the candidate or tactics to implement it. I’m not saying that Hillary Clinton won’t be the Democratic nominee, by the way. It’s still a bit more likely than not, I think. But the race is far from over, and truly competitive as it heads in Florida on Tuesday (where Clinton still seems likely to outpoll Obama, despite being blown out Saturday in South Carolina).
Speaking of competitive races far from over, the Republican nomination battle also moves to Florida on Tuesday. Unfortunately for Giuliani, who has spent months in the state campaigning and raising funds, the race is no longer competitive, and will soon be over. He proved to be the mirror image of Edwards. Though early on many thought Giuliani was the right GOP candidate for 2008, on the voting issues and with the campaign team most able tactically to take on the Clintons, his strategy of downplaying the early states in favor of a breakout in Florida proved to be his downfall.
Yes, the 2008 calendar was much more compressed than previous ones. Iowa came right after New Year’s, Wyoming two days later, New Hampshire three days after that, then Michigan, then Nevada and South Carolina in quick succession. But I never understood why the political professionals, both inside and outside the Giuliani campaign, believed this compressed schedule would clearly weaken the significance of the early contests. Because of his national name recognition and the respect he earned as mayor of what some once considered to be an ungovernable city, Giuliani still appeared to be competitive in the early states (except for Iowa) as late as early December. Still, the campaign put the vast majority of its resources in Florida. The strategy seemed to be working at first when Mike Huckabee won Iowa, John McCain won New Hampshire, and Mitt Romney won Wyoming and Michigan. With no consistent first-place finisher, the media had no one to crown as the GOP frontrunner.
But in reality, caucuses and primaries aren’t just first-past-the-post contests. Second and third place matter. Romney got solid shares of the vote in both Iowa and New Hampshire, something no one else did. More importantly, as Fred Thompson began to fade from the picture, Romney became the only viable Republican candidate who espoused traditional party positions in all three major policy areas: economics, social issues, and foreign policy. The race began to pit Romney the conservative manager against McCain the moderate maverick. By not playing in the early games, Giuliani left himself out of the story.
And lost his lead in Florida, where he had bet everything.
Neither Edwards nor Giuliani has embarrassed himself in his 2008 run. The two retain a strong, loyal, but ultimately insufficient following within their parties, and will likely be in demand as speakers, fundraisers, and possible political appointees in the future. But they won’t be presidents. That’s okay – most talented and hard-working politicians never get there, either. There are many other ways to serve and lead.
Hood is president of the John Locke Foundation.