Tuesday is shaping up to be a potentially decisive day for the Democratic race for the White House. If Sen. Hillary Clinton isn't able to win in the closely contested Ohio or Texas primaries, her bid for the presidency may be over. This reflects a tremendous change of voter opinion from a month ago, when she boasted of 20-point leads in both states.

How did the race come to this turn? Drew Westen, professor of psychology and psychiatry at Emory University and the head of a political and corporate consulting firm, Westen Strategies, has some ideas.

Westen is the author of "The Political Brain: The Role of Emotion in Deciding the Fate of the Nation" (PublicAffairs) --- a look at how politicians succeed or fail in capturing the hearts and minds --- but especially the hearts --- of voters:

Q: How do you see the Democratic primary season so far?

A: This is really as textbook a case of how and why emotion matters in presidential politics as we've ever seen.

Q: For both candidates?

A: Yes. Hillary Clinton has gradually improved her appeal to voters emotionally. But she was stuck between a rock and a hard place.

Q: Meaning ...?

A: This has been like an election between Hillary Clinton and Bill Clinton. She's all issues all the time, encyclopedic in her knowledge and would no doubt be as competent a president as we've ever had.

But Obama has the natural gifts that her husband has --- to make people feel that they're part of something bigger than them. He has that rare combination of what psychologists call "general intelligence," i.e., to think quickly and complexly, as well as the raw emotional and political intelligence that predicts success at the ballot box.

Q: But it wasn't a straight shot for Obama.

A: No, we saw the rise and fall and rise again of Obama. His poll numbers were dropping steadily from last spring through October of last year as he was matching her on issues. In many respects, he was running a traditional Democratic campaign defined by 10- or 14-point plans. This strategy has never worked and was ill-suited to a candidate with enormous emotional power.

Q: Has Clinton made mistakes?

A: Yes, she has never really answered a couple of stories out there about her that have defined her in the popular culture. One, that she's cold and ruthless. The other, that she is inauthentic and opportunistic and poll-driven. What is clear from watching campaigns that lose is that they need to control the stories that define them as well as their opponents.

Q: So what could she have done?

A: She could have told the story of her life --- of growing up in a conservative Republican home and then, with the rest of the nation, going through the tumult of the '60s. She could have talked about her traditional values that are American values --- hard work, devotion to community, religious faith --- and how they helped change a country in which black people and women were second-class citizens. That would have been a very powerful story. That would have explained a lot of what she was like.

Q: She tried to define Obama, saying that he lacked experience and that his oratory was "just words."

A: And if he were a less charismatic speaker, those stories may have worked. But once Obama got on his game, I don't think he was beatable by anybody.

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Last updated: 03/31/2008 - 09:26 AM