Don't forget there was sentiment in the Clinton camp (led by Mike Henry, it appears) to bypass Iowa completely and focus on New Hampshire. It was thought that as long as she won New Hampshire, the bandwagon would roll as scheduled. As it was, the temptation to play irresistible force and take Iowa too proved too much, leaving her vulnerable to Obama's upset there.

Then the polls overreacted, making it appear that Obama would blow away New Hampshire and sink the campaign. Her win, long projected and planned for, came to look like a last minute miracle to the public. In the Clinton camp, though, it was seen as vindication of their approach. Everyone from the candidate on down attributed her strong late decider appeal to her Saturday night debate performance, rather than the teary, spontaneous, from-the-heart moment she had that ran on every TV station around the day before the primary.

The point is that internally, Iowa must have looked like a minor setback that had been overcome. Things were working after all. And the chance to shake things up, which saved John Kerry in the fall of 2003, was missed.

If she'd lost New Hampshire then her money would have dried up, she'd have been declared 'finished' by the media and would have been out of the race before long. Without winning NH, she'd not have had the money to win Nevada and would have been without any sort of momentum. No way of maintaining the kind of organization that she needed to secure her tie on Super Tuesday. She'd have walked out of Super Tuesday with wins in NY and Arkansas and not much else. Wednesday morning she'd have left the race.

I think you're right that a loss in NH would have resulted in a staff shake-up that she needed. But I also think that such a loss would just have led to losing differently and faster.

This is a divisive candidate who went into the primary with huge unfavorables and broad but shallow support. I think that a loss was always in the cards so long as there was any sort of credible opposition.  If Barack Obama had never been born, John Edwards would be beating Clinton right now. Maybe with mere wins rather than landslides. But I think Hillary Clinton was doomed from the start.

That was/is it exactly.

I don't know whether Edwards would have been able to do what Obama did -- a big part of part of Obama's appeal is the prospect for change -- whatever that means to each individual -- and a significant amount of his credibility in that area stems from his relative newness on the national stage.

While Edwards arguably would have had a better claim to that mantel than Clinton, I'm not certain he could have caught fire the same way. But that's just some idle speculation on my part.

The point is that once a credible alternative presented itself, Clinton didn't have the kind of emotional tie to many of her supporters to keep them on board.  

In hindsight, Clinton's campaign was destined to self-destruct from the sheer weight of not only bad decisions but, especially in Iowa, from being so indecisive.

We are all very familiar with the infamous Mike Henry memo that suggested the campaign not participate in Iowa.  Once the memo was leaked, Senator Clinton came forward and stated clearly that she would compete in Iowa.  

But Clinton never really competed in Iowa to the extent she needed to in this state in order to win.  For months, the press had been stating that Iowa was indeed her weakest state but that if she could win in Iowa, the nomination would be hers.

Clinton kept campaigning in the state but never really invested the staff, money, and time she needed to win this state throughout most of 2007.  At one point, Obama had twice as many field offices opened in Iowa as she did.  Obama was spending time and reources there and John Edwards had spent what seemed to be most of his life in Iowa since losing in the 2004 general election.

Then, in December 2007, polls showed Obama's camapaign gaining ground and leading for the first time in Iowa.

The Clinton campaign then made another mistake in order to derail Obama.  They starting throwing millions of dollars  into Iowa, opening numerous field offices, sending hundreds of new staff memebers into the state, buying airtime on television and radio, etc.  They ran their Iowa campaign like a primary rather than a caucus state.  And Iowa is no typical caucus state.  Most caucus attenedees meet each of the canddates multiple times during the run up to the Iowa caucuses.  It's retail politics at its best, where a candidate has to ask for a voters support numerous times before closing the deal.  

Clinton never allocated time and resources over the life of the Iowa campaign to be in contention to win the state outright until it was too late.

And Clinton blew over $20 million dollars trying to win a state that, by most account, is the most dovish in the country, and where her vote for the Iraq war did not play well.  By partially competing in Iowa, she drained her campaign coffers and gave even more legitamacy to Obama's big win there.  

But the overspending there was the death nail.  We all now know that her campaign was broke by the end of Janaury and she had to lend her campaign 5 million dollars.

In hindsight, Mike Henry appears to have been the only one inside the Clinton campaign who really understood how futile it was to spend campaign resources in Iowa.  

The next bad decision was to let Bill Clinton off the leash and campaign freely and openly without parameters.

Senaor Clinton had stated in 2007 that she would use President Clinton as a type of roaming ambassador in the world to help repair our reputation, which has been stained beyond belief by W and his pack of inept neocons.  But it appears there was never any thought put into how best to put Bill Clinton to use on the campaign trail.  

After Iowa, Clinton won New Hmapshire, Clinton won the Nevada caucuses, but Obama beat her in national delegates 13-12, based on his strong support in upstate Nevada.

The camapign shifts to South Carolina's primary and BOOM!  The Wednesday before the primary, Bill Clinton's comments suggesting the primary in South Carolina would be decided by race and gender hits the airwaves, setting off a firestorm not only in South Carolina but throughout the country as well.  Cousin Bill was obviously trying to inject race into the primary as a way of lessening the fallout from a loss in South Carolina (USA TODAY).  But that comment, coupled with his comment comparing Obama to Jesse Jackson, blew up in his face.  It galvanized Obama's supporters throughout the state, igniting a turnout unprecedented in a Democratic primary in South Carolins.    

But President Clinton's comments hung in the air like the stench flowing from a manure farm and triggered a number of events that were devastating to the Clinton campaign and to Bill Clinton himself.  One, it provided a HUGE margin of victory for Obama in South Carolina.  It also provided us all with the first glimmer as to what white males in upcoming primaries would do - Clinton bested Obama in South Caolina amongst white males by only 28% to 27%.  Secondly, Obama supporters went nuts and unleashed a torrent of contributions to Obama which rose to levels the campaign saw after losing the New Hampshire primary.  

But the most damaging result of Bill Clinton's comments was that it solidifed Obama's roots and ties to black voters nationally and it tarnished Bill Clinton's legacy.  And the results have been stunning.  The following week, Super Tuesday, Obama annihilated Clinton amongst black voters across the board, but specifically in Georgia, Alabama, Connecticut, Missouri, and Delaware.  

But there is more to the story on Super Tuesday.  The Clinton campaign thought the nomination would be over on Super Tuesday due to their ability to carry the big states of California, New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, etc.  And they did indeed win these states.  But Obama spent time and resources in these states, and even though he lost them, he still picked up huge chunks of delegates based on how delegates were apportioned.  

But about 10:30 p.m., Tuesday evening, s tsunami was first sighted in Kansas.  Reports of 2,000 voters showing up for a caucus in a Kansas county in which 500 participants were expected starting hitting the airwaves and the tsunmai kept building all evening and into the early morning hours.  When it finally hit land and rolled back to sea, the results were stunning.  Obama crushed Clinton in caucuses held in Kansas, North Dakota, Minnesota, Colorado, Idaho, and Alaska.

Clinton's campaign made a hude tatcical mistake in ceding these caucus states to Obama.  Could they have made a difference had they contested these caucus states?  Absolutely.  By ceding these states, Obama built up huge leads and was awarded bones delegates in most of the states as his margins were SO BIG.  

Had Clinton use the same tactic that Obama had on Super Tuesday - compete everywhere, Clinton would have picked up a bigger share of delegates in most of these states.

Super Tuesday turned into a draw, with Clinton winning the overall poplular vote that day 50.2% to 49.8%, or a mere 53,000 votes out of 14.5 million votes cast (Huffington Post).  

And of course, the Clinton campaign had no plan after Tuesday, thinking the nomination would be wrapped up by then.  And, of course, in hindsight, they were right, but they had no idea it would be the beginning of their end.  At that point, the Clinton campaign was out of money and  dollars were rolling into Obama's coffers at a frenetic pace.

The following Saturday, tsunami's were sighted in Louisiana, Nebraska and Washington State, blowing out Clinton in each state.  The next day, Sunday, a tsunami hits the state of Maine, wiping Clinton out in the Maine caucuses, which were supposed to be competitive.

Then another Obama tsunami built up along the Atlantic coast, crashing inward up through the Chesapeake Bay with a direct hit into Virginia, Maryland and the District of Columbia.  Virginia in particular foreshadowed what was to come the following Tuesday in Wisconsin.  In Virginia and Maryland, Obama not only carried his base of black voters, up scale, educated white voters and young people, but also raided Clinton's base for the first time, harvesting large numbers of votes amongst those earning less than $50,000.00 a year, and almost winning female primary voters.  

Then, another tsunami hit Wisconsin, but this one appearing to be the most lethal to Clinton, losing much of her base of blue collar, less educated, working class  voters earning under $50,000 a year, along with women.  This, in a state which was tailored made for her campaign.  But BIG MO had kicked in for Obama after his blow out in VA, MD and D.C., and it was a blow out.  

So there you have it, as I see it.  A campaign built and based on miscalculations and misconceptions, which, taken together built a house of cards which collpased from the sheer weight of bad decisions, and, to be honest, incompetence.