Maybe she choked up in spite of herself, or maybe she choked up because focus group research said it would be a good rhetorical move. Who can tell with HRC anymore, particularly after her overuse of the crazy mechanical cackle whenever confronted with direct criticism? I'm not questioning the fact that she has human emotions, but she is so composed and calculating in her creation of a political personae that I suspect any emotional display was planned and vetted in advance.

Just seems funny that this would happen now in light of all the recent criticism that Clinton's campaign is too cynical and calculated.

I don't buy it.

I have so many opportunities for this country

What does that sentence even mean? I have so many opportunities for this country? Huh? It seems nonsensical and self-centered at the same time.

"You know, this is very personal for me. It's not just political, it's not just public. I see what's happening. We have to reverse it."

As a Senator Hillary Clinton had numerous opportunities to reverse what was happening, or, at the very least, to take a stand against it. She chose what was politically safe instead. Now she expects us to trust that she'll act differently if she's President?

I kind of don't buy it. I can just imagine HRC's handlers going "you need to get 28% more emotional; our focus groups show people responding well to that." and her finding some tears to put to work. Or maybe it's just tears of frustration she used in another context. As for why people run for president, I don't know. Anymore, I think anybody who actually wants to be president should probably be barred from running for the office, on the grounds that they're likely unfit to serve.

Maybe she believes passionately that she, and only she, can save the country -- but if that's so, why run such a Republicratic campaign to begin with? Why so cautiously right-of-center, why so carefully conventional? It doesn't ring true for me, this bit of rhetoric of hers, nor her emotive response. Not with how she's conducted her campaign -- it doesn't speak of passion, so much as determination on her part.

And this bit, like going from the tears straight into the talking points...

"Some of us are ready and some us are not. Some of us know what we will do on Day One, and some of us haven't really thought through enough. And so when we look at the array of problems we have, and the potential for it getting, really spinning out of control, this is one of the most important questions America has faced."

...is especially suspect to me. Maybe the thing spinning out of control is her campaign, and it's frustrating her, so she projected that into her talking points of the day, extended it to the country at large.

Maybe Clinton just said a bunch of years ago, "Look, Bill, I WANT to be President." and then they hired people who'd help her achieve that goal, as if pure willpower, determination, and ambition were enough to get somebody into that office. I worry that perhaps she, the candidate herself, is the biggest barrier to her ambition, because what do you do if you're your own biggest stumbling block?

Hillary Clinton is not my first choice for the Democratic nomnation, still, I do not like to see her unfairly savaged. It seems to me that her words were at least as much, maybe more, about the plight of the country than about her own political plight.

with all you men. It's pathetic.

What has Obama done in his 3 years in the senate? Inspired? Created a broad governing coalition? Gotten republicans to cross the aisle and vote with him?

No. No. No. And no.

He hasn't been able to do anything in his current job, let alone "change" anything.

Pelosi and Reid took impeachment off the table to help create an environment of togetherness and look where that has gotten them. They now have lower approval ratings than Bush, and he still gets his way.

Republicans still side with Bush policies. Obama hasn't done anything to change that. He's an academic and an orator. But he has not record of change. It's complete bullshit.

That's all it is...she's looking to get sympathy vote from women. I doubt it'll work. The problem she has is, people just don't like her. Additionally, she's a polarizing person so which means the moderate vote won't go to her at all.

I think Obama has a much better shot at pulling additional votes from moderates.

I'm baffled that some of you just sit there behind your computers waiting to savage Hillary Clinton no matter what she says or does. I don't know how any of the Democratic candidates make it through the day given the shear unfair sliminess of the opposition. Spaghetti-Monster help us if these letters are from our co-party members.

Think job interview ... what will these candidates do for us in the critical position we are hiring them for. We've had enough of frat-boy hiring practices haven't we?

"You know, I have so many opportunities for this country, and I just don't want to see us fall backwards -- no."

Considering where and how far we've gone under Bush, falling backwards seems like a pretty good idea right now.

Tim, Ed Muskie cried while campaigning. I certainly didn't hear her voice crack or notice her wiping away tears. Senator Clinton lets down the mask of her public persona for a moment and you're going to leap on it?

That's not to say that the MSM won't run with it. It seems as if HRC is damned if she does and damned if she doesn't.

I was in her hospitality room at the DNC winter meeting and asked her to sign a tiny Young Democrat tee shirt for my grandson who was born while his father was in Iraq.

All the other Dem. candidates had signed, and been gracious and engaging. I was with a military-focused non-profit advocacy group, and they were all willing to have intense meaningful dialogue with us.

When it came to Hillary, however, she nearly marched over me rather than sign the shirt, and pretended not to notice my request until others became insistent on my behalf. She signed, obviously in great pain at having to do so. She made no eye contact with me. She made no comment. At that moment, I knew that Hillary has no empathy. I wasn't a howling military mom, I am an articulate and intelligent advocate in perhaps the greatest unneccesary hardship in our entire history.

I'm not buying her tears. If they were real, she would have been able to look me in the eye and say simply..."thank your son for his service", even if she didn't want to say she would do her best to get him home.