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This Hillary Clinton bobblehead, created by Dayna Meserve, was on sale at the CPAC convention. (Photo courtesy of Dayna Meserve, http://www.hillnoshesgottogo.com/)

WASHINGTON — Her image festooned on a lively array of bumper stickers, buttons, t-shirts and bobblehead dolls — her head wobbly, her mouth agape and her body substituted by a donkey — Hillary Clinton continues her more than 15-year run as conservatives’ most despised person in America.

Conservatives may find John McCain uninspiring, but they have nothing but cold, hard zeal for the woman he could face in the presidential election next November, the former first lady who once called them the “vast right-wing conspiracy.”

“I am here to contribute to the downfall and demise of Hillary and what she would do to this country. I am here as a conservative, as a mother, as a grandmother,” said Dayna Meserve, who created the “Hill No! She’s Got to Go,” bobblehead dolls for sale at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington.

“I would rather she not get the nomination and just get dropped-kicked off the planet,” Meserve said.

Clinton’s image, and the very thought that she might become America’s 44th president, lent an edge to the CPAC proceedings last week.

“There are so many people who — even Democrats — just hate Hillary,” said Courtney Morrow of Crown Forum, which publishes conservative authors and subjects and displayed its latest product line, including a number of expose-styled Clinton titles.

But a conundrum pervades the conservative ranks. While they despise Clinton, many of them hope she will be the Democrats’ presidential candidate in the fall, because they believe she will galvanize disenchanted conservatives to vote.

With polls indicating that Barack Obama would do better than Clinton against McCain, conservatives are feeling torn about whether they should plot her demise or pray for her nomination.

“I think she has the potential to get conservatives out to the polls,” said Michelle Healy, director of donor relations for Citizens United, a conservative activist group that has been running a negative television ad comparing the legislative record of McCain to Clinton. Citizens United was also hawking copies of “Hillary: The Movie” at the CPAC event.

“It’s a double-edged sword, yet people get motivated when they see a specific threat.”

Turnout is critical to many Clinton-haters, who note that the number of Republican voters participating in primaries and caucuses has paled in comparison to the Democrats.

Most people interviewed at the CPAC convention said they would not join opinion makers like Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter in rejecting McCain. Instead, they are starting to conceptualize strategy for a general election that pits McCain against either Clinton or Obama.

“We have a real chance to win against Hillary,” said Dick Collins, a Texas Republican who runs StopHerNow.com. “It will energize conservatives to get active again in campaigning.”

But not everyone is convinced that a liberal bogeyman — or woman, as the case may be — can pull conservatives out of their funk and deliver a Republican victory in November.

“I just don’t buy it,” Joy McCann, who publishes the Little Miss Attila Web log, said of the idea that a Clinton nomination would be a boon for Republicans.

“Look, Nancy Pelosi was going to do the same thing,” she said, noting that the threat of Pelosi becoming Speaker of the House conjured the same prediction before the 2006 mid-term election.

“People aren’t just going to wake up, we have to wake them up,” she said. “[They] won’t do it without a huge organizing push by us.”

Others said the Clinton factor may be a bit overstated.

“I don’t think she plays much of a role here right now,” said Katie O’Malley, a columnist for Human Events magazine.

O’Malley says it’s too early to focus on the Democratic candidate.

“I think we are still struggling for the soul of our party. We need to get our head together, and then we can get focused.”

Part of that process entails getting behind a candidate. McCain, who is running far ahead in the delegate count for the Republican nomination, has failed to charm the conservative crowd, as demonstrated by the mixed reception to his speech at the CPAC.

McCain became the virtual GOP nominee after Mitt Romney suspended his campaign last week, but Mike Huckabee, who won the Louisiana primary and Kansas caucus on Saturday, remains in the picture.

Huckabee wasn’t a favorite at CPAC either — participants there weren’t convinced his evangelical Christian credentials made up for what they say is a lack of fiscal conservatism — but the weekend results show that the party is as hesitant as Democrats about the best route to victory.

In both private and public conversations at CPAC, conservatives said they were unsure whether McCain, 71, can beat Clinton or Obama, although they appear to worry more about the youthful and charismatic Illinois senator.

But in the meantime, what better way to liven the atmosphere than to concentrate on an old foe? Clinton, as some vendors pointed out, is good for business.

“She’s the gift that keeps on giving,” said Kitt Gasper, who works with Meserve on the bobblehead business.

“Hillary Clinton is great for business,” said Stacey Stine of ConservativeShirts.com. This year, big sellers included a host of anti-Clinton buttons and a t-shirt announcing the “same old socialism” and portraying Clinton alongside the iconic depiction of Marxist revolutionary Che Guevara.

“If she were to win the presidency, we’d sell even more anti-Hillary merchandise,” Stine said, before delivering her knockout blow:

“But she would raise my taxes so much it wouldn’t matter anyway.”

This entry was posted on Monday, February 11th, 2008 at 10:18 am and is filed under Hillary Clinton, John McCain, Washington D.C.. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.