THE NOTE: Second Looks

Dec. 17, 2007 -- Put away your gun, Mitt Romney. (Varmints!)

Put down your hand, Fred Thompson. (Yes, we know you're still a candidate.)

Spend another night in a Holiday Inn Express, Mike Huckabee. (And take along a few copies of Foreign Affairs for some light reading.)

Save the magic carpet, Barack Obama.

Hold your Joe-mentum, John McCain.

Mari-mentum can wait, too, John Edwards.

Your tea won't get cold, Ron Paul.

Here comes the new, improved (freshly endorsed and officially more likeable) Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y. Four things Camp Clinton wants you to know:

-- People like her. (Exciting new site: http://www.TheHillaryIKnow.com)

-- Her family loves her (but they don't really care for Sen. Barack Obama).

-- Important people like her (particularly a certain group of newspaper editors in Des Moines).

-- She's just like Iowans (except she has a Hill-A-Copter.)

Two things they don't want you to know:

-- Her aides do not like each other at the moment (but they're not going to let that get in the way of the task at hand).

-- They remain terrified of Barack Obama (and should be worried about John Edwards, too).

The Des Moines Register's endorsement of Clinton matters less for the votes it moves than for the storyline it shifts. The wooing worked, and the timing is perfect for a campaign that's been near panic in recent weeks.

Notice who's riding high (literally, given the new campaign helicopter, and figuratively, giving the suddenly glowing press coverage).

If Democratic caucus-goers accept this frame, Hillary Clinton will be the presidential nominee: "The choice, then, comes down to preparedness: Who is best prepared to confront the enormous challenges the nation faces -- from ending the Iraq war to shoring up America's middle class to confronting global climate change?" the editorial board wrote. "Obama, her chief rival, inspired our imaginations. But it was Clinton who inspired our confidence."

How's this for confidence? A full round on five morning shows on Monday. (Think that would have happened if the Register went with Obama?)

"There's just an enormous amount of positive energy," Clinton told ABC's Chris Cuomo on "Good Morning America".

But she seemed a bit conflicted when asked about her husband's recent comments, questioning Obama's qualifications. "This campaign is about me and my ideas," she said.

Then, a few moments later: "Your spouse gets to stand up for you, gets to speak for you, just like, you know, the wives of everybody else running. I don't see that we have to respond to everything that is said by anybody else. I'm very glad that Bill is out there making the case for me."

And this new explanation for the Billy Shaheen incident: "We asked him to step down," Clinton said on MSNBC. (Silly us thought he resigned on his own accord -- wonder who could have made us think that, Mark Penn?)

Clinton continued, "Every time somebody in my campaign says something that we don't believe is right, appropriate, we take care of it, we move quickly." (Every time? So we assume, senator, that you asked Tom Vilsack to step aside and he refused?)

Back to Bill . . . the former president was more making the case against Obama than he was arguing for his wife on Charlie Rose. Again and again he came back to Obama's lack of experience, calling it "less predictable" and "rolling the dice" to go with someone with so little experience. "When I was a governor and young and thought I was the best politician in the Democratic Party, I didn't run the first time. I could have," the former president said.

Shake-up or no shake-up (and the answer is no), the former president is making his presence and opinions known with his wife's campaign, per The New York Times' Patrick Healy. "The 'change, change, change' phrase, as some advisers call it, was coined by Mr. Clinton after he told campaign officials that the old strategy of running like an incumbent front-runner was not enough," Healy writes.

"Mr. Clinton is not running his wife's campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination. But less than three weeks before the Iowa caucuses, and with polls showing a tight race, he has become the most powerful force in her political operation besides the candidate herself." (And that, Clinton watchers know, cuts at least two ways.)