Challenging the conventional wisdom about Hillary

Chuck Todd, one of my favorite political analysts, challenged the media's conventional wisdom that Hillary Clinton is the odds on favorite in the race for the Democratic nomination:

As the likelihood of a Clinton campaign becomes a reality, more reasonsturn up that suggest why she could lose the nomination. In fact, theprimary may be harder for her than the general election. A badthree-week period at the wrong time in the wrong state could doom abid, particularly with this front-loaded primary calendar. While thesame thing can happen in a general, the same ridiculous scoring ofexpectations doesn't apply to general elections the way it does inprimary battles.

The primaries are mostly about momentum.  Remember the Dean collapse in Iowa?  No, I am not referring to the "Dean scream" -- it happened before that.  As Iowa voters had second thoughts about Dean and Gephardt, the two front runners, both Kerry and Edwards, had all the momentum going into the final week.  In the end, Kerry won Iowa, and went on to win the nomination.  Because of the front-loaded primary schedule, as Chuck Todd alluded to, the nomination might all come down to the final week before Iowa.  So much will be decided in so little time.