I'm hearing so many awed estimations of Hillary's destiny as Democratic party nominee, but no one seems to be stating the obvious--how would she fare against a strong rival?

There is no question that Hillary is a strong candidate--she's got the support, the money, the smarts and the experience. Would you say that any of her rivals is her equal?

The irony here is that the Democrats are fortunate this time around to have at least one strong candidate as opposed to the disaster of 2004, but is it reasonable to praise her performance because she is kicking Edwards and Obama around?

Edwards is imploding--the house, the haircut, the hedgefund and now the revelation that his poverty initiative was a thinly veiled scam to allow him to fund his campaign for the presidency without organizing and exploratory committee. His poll numbers are dropping like a stone and Hillary didn't have to make a move.

Obama is demonstrating--rather predictably--his inexperience. His campaign simply isn't reflecting the promise his convention address showed and then there is this:

Despite often-lofty rhetoric that he plans to bring the nation a "new kind of politics," Sen. Barack Obama has surrounded himself with operatives skilled in the old-school art of the political back stab.

Yet when Obama was criticized this week for opposition research memos critical of Sen. Hillary Clinton's ties to India and Indian-Americans, he was quick to blame his staff.

"It was a screw-up on the part of our research team," he told editors and reporters with The Des Moines Register. "It wasn't anything I had seen or my senior staff had seen."

That is starting to sound familiar. It was at least the third time since February the Illinois Democrat has blamed his staff for a glitch.

Very unpresidential Barry.

It will remain to be seen whether he has kept pace with the Clinton machine in the fund-raising effort. The way it looks though, the learning curve is just too steep.

The irony is, that a cakewalk to the nomination makes her very vulnerable in the general election. She will have won without the help of the revitalized left-wing of the party, which is both a blessing and a curse. A blessing because she can appeal to the moderates, and a curse because the left represents the dynamism in the party these days and is the Get-out-the-vote (GOTV) engine.

Hillary might be able to finesse the primaries in the absence of strong rivals, but she can never inspire love in comparison the hatred George Bush produces.