The End of Inevitability

Clinton's network of consultants and deep-pocketed friends may be her best asset in a long, expensive contest. But her big campaign machine is also costly. Clinton spent on average more than $1.4 million a month during her Senate campaign last year, including $400,000 a month on consultants. It's not clear how much cash she's burning now, but her consultants remain the same.

Finding a lot of new donors, even among some of Clinton's natural allies, may not be easy. Blitz founded the National Women Business Leaders Council for the DNC in 2004. But when she called on her group to attend a Clinton fund-raiser last month, less than a third signed up. "I was surprised when I found out this wasn't a greater percentage of women," she says. "I know there are some major New York women donors that are not supporting Hillary to the extent they could." Why not? Hope Winthrop also raised a seven-figure sum for Kerry in '04 and thinks of Clinton as "a great senator." But she's more attracted to what she sees as Obama's freshness. "There was a sense of inevitability around the Clinton campaign that maybe made people a little wary," she says. "Now they will see there are several choices out there and it's not all locked up." That's the problem with inevitability: once the all-powerful aura is gone, it's hard to get it back.

With Holly Bailey, Jonathan Darman and Eleanor Clift

© 2007