In a New Republic article on the rivalry between Howard Dean and Hillary Clinton, a “Clinton strategist” touts how she will have her “own field staff, starting way before the primaries begin, right through November 7”:

Clinton’s camp is seeking to change this landscape. Its strategy appears to be twofold. First, it is laying the groundwork to circumvent the DNC in the event that Clinton wins the nomination. Her advisers see Dean as a maverick, and they want to depend on him as little as possible during the general election. “The DNC is going to be peripheral,” says one Clinton strategist. “We are going to have our own field staff, starting way before the primaries begin, right through November 7.” He points out that she is prepared to reject public financing during the primaries and the general election. (Clinton does not lack for money: She has raised $32.2 million for her Senate reelection and has $22 million in the bank–all transferable to her presidential campaign, according to PoliticalMoneyLine.) This would allow her to keep the field staff she develops during the primaries on her payroll during the general election–instead of shifting it to the DNC, as previous candidates have done. Plus, in a move widely and correctly interpreted as a rebuke to Dean, Clinton strategist Harold Ickes recently established a private voter database to compete with a similar database being built by the DNC. Ickes’s move–as well as Clinton’s formidable array of experienced advisers, including Terry McAuliffe, Howard Wolfson, James Carville, Mark Penn, and others–will give Clinton added independence from the DNC.

A little arrogant, are we? Clinton’s strategists ought to spend less time worrying about how they will isolate the DNC during the general election and more time worrying about the primaries. They’re going to have a fight on their hands when Democrats recognize her weakness as a candidate and start to think about spending another four years in the political wilderness.