Targeting Rivals, Clinton Gets Back on Track

LAS VEGAS, Nov. 15, 2007 — -- After her roughest two weeks on the presidential campaign trail, New York Sen. Hillary Clinton showed up on a debate stage in Las Vegas Thursday night with a new aggressive game plan and appeared to successfully get her campaign ship back on course.

In her new strategy, Clinton not only acknowledged her preparation for more incoming heat — "this pantsuit, it's asbestos tonight" — but also went on the offense against her two main rivals for the Democratic presidential nomination.

Early on in the evening, she delivered what was clearly a planned hit on Illinois Sen. Barack Obama's health-care plan. "[Sen. Obama] talks a lot about stepping up and taking responsibility and taking strong positions," Clinton said. "But when it came time to step up and decide whether or not he would support universal health-care coverage, he chose not to do that. His plan would leave 15 million Americans out. That's about the population of Nevada, Iowa, South Carolina and New Hampshire," she added in a nod to the four key states that kick off the nomination contest in January.

Clinton also made sure to point out that former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards did not propose a universal health-care plan in his first presidential campaign in 2004.

Obama attempted to continue to portray Clinton as a waffler — a characterization that took root at the last Democratic debate and has been dogging her ever since. "What the American people are looking for right now is straight answers to tough questions, and that is not what we've seen out of Sen. Clinton on a host of issues," Obama said.

However, Clinton delivered a performance that provided little evidence to support that accusation Thursday evening. For example, she finally narrowed her answer about whether or not illegal immigrants should be able to acquire drivers' licenses to a single word, "no."

In fact, it was Obama who seemed to struggle with his answer to the question about drivers' licenses. CNN's Wolf Blitzer asked, "Do you support or oppose driver's licenses for illegal immigrants?" And Obama tried to dance on the head of a pin. "I am not proposing that that's what we do," he said before adding, "I support the notion that we have to deal with public safety and that driver's licenses at the same level can make that happen."

After rocking Clinton's campaign back on its heels for a couple of weeks, this issue may now force Obama to continue to explain why he supports a broadly unpopular position among Democrats and Republicans.