Hillary Clinton has a hard road to navigate to the Presidency. Number one she is a woman, and while that should not be a big deal, in this polarized political nation where Presidents win by a few percentage points, each handicap is in play. She also has the baggage of her husbands failed Presidency. But beyond that, she has her own real problems: she lacks the stature to be President. And Richard Cohen, a devout leftist, sees it as clear as anyone:

The swipe at Petraeus was contained in a full-page ad the antiwar group MoveOn.org placed in the New York Times last week. It charged that Petraeus was “cooking the books” about conditions in Iraq and cited statements of his that have turned out to be either (1) not true, (2) no longer true, (3) possibly not true or (4) like everything else in Iraq, impossible to tell. Whatever the case, using “betray” — a word associated with treason — recalls the ugly McCarthy era, when for too many Republicans dissent corresponded with disloyalty. MoveOn.org and the late senator from Wisconsin share a certain fondness for the low blow.

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It may seem unfair to single out Clinton in this matter when the bunker in which she took shelter was crowded with her fellow quivering candidates. But Clinton is the front-runner, quite possibly the next president of the United States, so it is reasonable to focus on her and wonder if, as some allege, she does indeed have a spine. In this instance, it was nowhere to be found.

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Yesterday, Clinton announced her health-care plan. Good for her. But you never had any doubt, did you, that she was going to have one — and a plan for everything else. The issue with Hillary Clinton is not whether she’s smart or experienced but whether she has — how do we say this? — the character to be president.

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The MoveOn.org ad was the moment for Clinton to rise above hackdom. It was a moment for her to insist that the business of politics, not to mention governing, is made even uglier and more difficult when people who merely differ with one another resort to insult. It was a moment for her to say that an Army general, under orders and attempting to fulfill a mission, should not be so casually trashed — especially since she herself has been on the other side of the Iraq war issue and said things she must now regret. And it was a moment for her to trot out her favorite phrase and use it, not in her own defense for once but in defense of someone else. That moment is gone — maybe because for Hillary Clinton it never arrived in the first place.

So far Hillary has failed to demonstrate she does have what it takes to be President. Cohen is dead on here, she had the moment to stand up for our military and for someone else. Selfish Presidents we know all too well (again, her husband comes to mind). We need people who say damn the polls I am going to take action, not take action based on polls and what effects there may be on their legacy.

She road her famous husband’s name and foibles to two terms as a Senator. That is not sufficient evidence of what it takes to be President. She is no Iron Maggie Thatcher, Prime Minister of England when Reagan was in the Oval Office. That woman has a spine. As Hillary cowers in front of the far left she only demonstrates she is not the person we need to lead this country. Cowering gets Americans killed, as her husband reminds us.