Carville Doubts, Hillary Dodges, McAuliffe 'More Confident Than Ever'

February 14th, 2008 9:13 AM

Three voices of the Clinton campaign, three distinctly different takes on its fortunes. James Carville is candid about the pickle Hillary's in. Hillary, true to form, utterly evades the question. Ah, but there's always Terry McAuliffe. The proud graduate of the Baghdad Bob School of Flackery this morning declared that he's "more confident than he's ever been" about winning the nomination.

Carville, appearing on last night's Larry King, couldn't have been more succinct.

LARRY KING: If Hillary loses Texas or Ohio, is it over?

JAMES CARVILLE: Yes.

View Carville and Hillary video here.

Today's Good Morning America aired a conversation between Hillary and ABC's Kate Snow. Hillary dodged the question in a way that would have earned her a spot Vince Vaughan's team.

KATE SNOW: I want to ask you about something James Carville said today, I don't know if you heard this, but he said you're behind, she's behind, and he said make no mistake if she loses either Texas or Ohio, she's done. What do you think about that?

HILLARY CLINTON: Well, you know, I think that my job is to do the very best I can in Texas and Ohio. I think these two states are big states, they're states that are very reflective of our population as a country, and I'm just going to do the very best I can to be successful in both of them.

Hmm, so Texas is a big state. Who knew? But if Hillary was her old evasive self, you can always count on Terry to look squarely into the camera and deliver the party line, no matter how much it might strain credulity. The Clinton campaign chairman appeared on this morning's Today.

TERRY MCAULIFFE: There's a long way to go. We're going to win the next three big, big states, and we're going to win this nomination. I feel more confident of that today than I have ever been.

Of course. After losing eight consecutive races by crushing margins in which huge chunks of Hillary's base moved to Obama, why wouldn't Terry feel more confident than ever?

View McAuliffe video here.

Let's see if the MSM will cover the internal contradictions in the Clinton camp.