Angling for high office

In a move that surprised almost no one, Hillary Clinton this week announced she is going to run for President of the United States. “Everyday Americans need a champion, and I want to be that champion,” Mrs Clinton said in a video announcing her run.

Mrs Clinton, who also served as a senator for New York and Secretary of State, ran for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2008 but lost to Barack Obama. The overwhelming Democratic favourite, she has been expected to declare her candidacy for months. The Guardian breaks the announcement down as it happened.

As anyone familiar with ‘The West Wing’ or ‘House of Cards’ knows, this is just the beginning. Before even running for President, Clinton will have to win the democratic primary – although the New York Times calls it “one of the least contested races, without an incumbent, for the Democratic presidential nomination in recent history”.

Starting in January next year, both the Democrats and the Republican Party will hold a series of primary elections to select their candidate for the Presidential election. The New York Times breaks down who is running with an infographic, which includes quoting Vice-President Joe Biden as saying “honest to God, I haven’t made up my mind.”

Slate argues that Clinton’s most likely competitors are lagging well behind on current polling. “The answer for why Clinton is so popular (among Democrats, at least) is easy: Not only is she strongly associated with one of the most well-liked presidents in recent memory—her husband, Bill Clinton—but she also retains considerable goodwill from her first presidential campaign and her service in Obama’s State Department, where she disproved the idea that she’s only in the game for herself.”

On the other side only two Republicans have confirmed they’re running, Senators Ted Cruz and Rand Paul. But there are another ten looking into it, including Former Florida Governor, and George W.’s brother, Jeb Bush. Cruz released a video saying “We’re ready for Hillary. We know exactly what to expect: Hillary Clinton represents the failed policies of the past.” Rand Paul angled at the youth vote by tweeting an animated .gif.

And Jeb Bush attacked Clinton’s foreign policy in a video, saying “conservative principles will grow our economy, put our fiscal house in order and make our great country even stronger.”

“We must do better than the Obama-Clinton foreign policy that has damaged relationships with our allies and emboldened our enemies. Better than their failed, big government policies that grow our debt and stand in the way of real economic growth and prosperity.”

As well as “everyday” Americans, Clinton is expected to continue her focus on gender issues, including positioning herself as the country’s wise, smart, sassy grandmother. “The ‘grandmothers know best’ strategy – already tested as a Twitter hashtag – could also help win over more traditional voters,” writes Suzanne Goldenberg in The Guardian “and, crucially, help inoculate Clinton, who is 67, against ageist tropes that are more likely to be slung against a female candidate.”

While the pundits at Fox News might consider that “there’s got to be a down side to a woman president,” CNN suggests that Clintons’ candidacy is likely to be a barometer by which to measure gender equality in the States. “She began the 2008 race with levels of name recognition that many candidates never achieve, and she is even more well-known today. But that means that she also enters the electoral arena with 23 years of public accomplishments and 23 years of well-publicized baggage. Voters, donors, journalists and pundits all hold clear impressions of Clinton before she ever eats a corn dog in Iowa, steps onto a debate stage in New Hampshire or takes a shot of bourbon in Kentucky.”

Simply saying it’s time to elect a woman to America’s highest office will be an important part of her message, writes The New Yorker’s John Cassidy – she’ll also have to explain how she wants to lead the country. “Can she do it? It won’t necessarily be easy and, almost certainly, it won’t be pleasant to watch. Barring something unexpected, the former Secretary of State and First Lady will be engaged in the fight of her life for the next nineteen months. But if there’s one thing we’ve learned about her over the years, it’s that she’s a battler.”

Along with the scandals that have dogged Clinton in her many years in public life, she will also have to decide how closely to align herself to the Barack Obama presidency. On top of that she’ll have to figure out how to cast herself as one of the everyday Americans she wants to champion – how to make her look like a real person. At Buzzfeed, Ruby Cramer and Megan Apper write about the gap – real or perceived – between Clinton and “real life”.

“Operatives who have been building her second presidential campaign — which is planned to begin Sunday with an online video — have conjured up words like “intimate” and “informal” to describe the “tone” of the “first 100 days,” they write. “They talk about retail-politicking, the hard-working, old-fashioned way. About “voters” — and about allowing them more accessibility to the candidate than in 2008.”

In 2008, “Mrs Clinton was also criticised for running a campaign that showed little personality,” writes the BBC’s Anthony Zurcher, “controlled to the point of appearing programmed. It's why the moments she did reveal a more human side, such as when she choked back tears in New Hampshire or touted the ‘18 million cracks in the glass ceiling’ after conceding defeat - were so memorable.”

Statistician and writer Nate Silver points out that the odds of Clinton winning the presidency are “roughly a 50/50 proposition”. He cites the economy, running in the aftermath of Obama’s term in office, and demographic trends as reasons people should take the polls – for much of this year – with a grain of salt.

“Clinton is so well-known,” he writes, “that it’s almost as if voters are dispensing with all the formalities and evaluating her as they might when she’s on the ballot next November. About half of them would like to see her become president and about half of them wouldn’t. Get ready for an extremely competitive election.”

The presidential election being more than a year and a half away hasn’t stopped, of course, the parsing of every word and campaign strategy. Buzzfeed breaks down the celebrity support, while Slate, the New Yorker, the New York Times and the Washington Post all examine Clinton’s announcement video. NPR embraces listicles, with five things you should know about Clinton, while others have taken aim at both the campaign’s logo, and her own Twitter banner.