Game Plans and the Road Out of Texas

Tonight, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama debate in Austin, Texas. It is not overstating it to say that there hasn't been a night like this in Texas politics in a long, long time. National politics revolves around Texas not just for tonight, but for the next two weeks, and with good reason: this is the battleground upon which the Democratic nomination will be decided. Don't let anyone give you any noise about Ohio or Pennsylvania: if the Clinton campaign can't figure out how to win in Texas, and win big, the race is over, even by former President Bill Clinton's admission.

The solution that some inside the Clinton campaign have suggested is to draw sharp distinctions between their candidate and the man from Illinois. They've got more of a battle plan than that, but you've already started to see the results of a frustrated Mark Penn in Clinton's intensifying rhetoric over the last few days.

Sharp distinctions are no longer optional for the Clinton campaign, which has struggled to regain frontrunner status even as it ceded the title to Barack Obama in an exercise in expectations management. Now, bleak days in the shadow of an Obama winning streak stretch out towards March 4th, and sharp distinctions are a necessity. Tonight, Hillary Clinton must illustrate herself — her experience and qualifications and everything else she wants to draw attention to — as the candidate of choice, and she must do so unapologetically. Otherwise, the road which led her campaign to Texas will not lead it anywhere else.

This is not a race that should make it to the convention; it may, but it should not. Both candidates and both campaigns are populated by people who understand the potential danger in burning the earth with a brokered convention, especially in light of all the positives the Democratic Party can garner from a race with two phenomenal candidates. The time for the open hand has passed, for both campaigns, and the time for the fist has come. And I contend that we haven't really seen real fire thus far. I expect Clinton to be on offense, and she should be. She has hoped for debates and asked for debates and this debate may end up being a defining moment not just in the primary, but in the entire election. This may not be the last debate of the race, but it may be the last debate that matters.