Clinton hoping sisterhood helps revive her candidacy

Fighting to survive, Hillary Rodham Clinton is counting on female power to energise her faltering presidential bid. She’s hoping a double-digit lead among women in Ohio is the answer.

“I am thrilled to be running to be the first woman president, which I think would be a sea change in our country and around the world,” the Democratic senator said this week in Cleveland, emphasising anew the pioneering aspect of her candidacy.

A woman in the White House, Clinton said, would present “a real challenge to the way things have been done, and who gets to do them and what the rules are.”

The remarks had a call-to-action flair and underscored just how much she is relying on women, always a key part of her support, to help her win Ohio and, perhaps, Texas on Tuesday as she seeks to get back on track in the Democratic nomination fight.

She has urgent reason to prod the sisterhood into action.

Senator Barack Obama has racked up 11 straight wins to lead the Democratic convention delegate hunt. Clinton has not won a primary in a month and is looking for big-state victories to breathe new life into her campaign.

Clinton leads in Ohio in recent polling, while Obama has a slight edge in Texas.

Women may hold the key for Clinton, particularly in the Midwestern state of Ohio. Polls in the past week have shown her with a wide advantage – 17 percentage points in one poll, 18 in another – among Ohio women. She also leads among Texas women, but the margin is slimmer.

“If Hillary is going to regain the front-runner status and win the nomination, it starts with and ends with women,” said Jenny Backus, a Democratic strategist who is not aligned with either candidate. “She has struck a chord with women, especially in Ohio.”

On Thursday, Clinton stopped at a Bob Evans Restaurant in Rio Grande, Ohio, and made a beeline for the counter and the all-female wait staff. She posed for pictures, arms around them for a photo op worthy of the “Nine to Five” song that often is featured at her events. “I’ve waited tables before,” she told them. “That was when I was much younger.”

Ohio Democrats say women here admire her for the barriers she has broken and the troubles she had overcome. That good will, they say, coupled with the support of popular Governor Ted Strickland and her jobs-focused economic message, has resonated with women across economic lines, education levels and ages.

The conquering-obstacles element is a theme Clinton embraced during a debate in Austin, Texas, last week, when she appeared to allude to her husband’s infidelity.

Asked to describe a moment that tested her the most, she said: “Well, I think everybody here knows I’ve lived through some crises and some challenging moments in my life.” The audience clapped knowingly.

But, in recent weeks, Obama has made inroads into Clinton’s overall hold on female voters.

Before primary voting began, Clinton had an enormous lead over him among all women. An AP-Ipsos poll in December showed her with 52 percent support to 19 percent for him.

Exit polls for the AP and television networks from 22 Democratic primaries where the candidates have competed showed her with a slimmer lead among women, 51 percent to 45 percent.

The apparent erosion was acute in the most recent primaries where exit polling was conducted. Obama won among women in the Louisiana, Maryland and Virginia primaries, while the two candidates tied most recently in Wisconsin.

As she campaigns, Clinton tries to strike a balance. She often tells audiences that while she is proud to be running as a woman, she should be elected because she is the best candidate and not because of her gender.

Still, at pivotal times, she has campaigned alongside daughter Chelsea and mother Dorothy Rodham, and invoked an us-versus-them pitch.

“In so many ways, this all-women’s college prepared me to compete in the all-boys club of presidential politics,” she said in November at her alma mater Wellesley College in Massachusetts, speaking about the challenges of being a woman in a campaign environment that men long have dominated.

The candidate has, however, struggled with just how much of her femininity to show.

After women turned away from her in Iowa, Clinton grew emotional days before the New Hampshire primary.

“This is very personal for me,” she said, adding, “Some of us are right, and some of us are not. Some of us are ready, and some of us are not.”

That moment of humility has been credited with helping her win back women who ultimately brought her victory in New Hampshire.

She hopes they deliver again Tuesday. (AP)