Disclaimer: Week 7 of the partisan candidate diaries. I am not associated with any of the campaigns, just a long-time observer of Democratic presidential politics and the father of a college daughter.

Senator Clinton appeared on "This Week,""Fox News Sunday", "Face the Nation and "Meet the Press" this morning. She was also on CNN's "Late Edition." (Photos: ABCNews.com, Fox, via AFP/Getty Images, CBS.com, Alex Wong/"Meet the Press")

It's hard to imagine a better week for a candidate. It started with the much anticipated unveiling of Hillary Clinton's American Health Choices plan, which kept her front and center of the media circus for most of the week. So, why not cap the week with appearances on all five major Sunday news shows, including (gasp!) Fox News.

Clinton is nothing if not a saavy politician. She understands that she is a high visibility, high demand guest and has played hard to get over the years, making just a handful of appearances on the Sunday shows. Of course, these shows are a double-edged sword. Politicians love the exposure, but the formula is set in concrete: sit the politician down and play "gotcha" and "ahh ha!" with video clips and quotes from the vaults. "Senator, so and so, back in high school, you said...." Or, the every popular, "Many people say that you have not stopped beating your wife. How do you answer these charges?" Many a candidate has been brought to his knees, most famously, Ted Kennedy who had no answer to the question, "Why are you running for President?"

Russert, Wallace, Shieffer. It's a tired old shtick. But, a tired old shtick every Presidential candidate has to endure. Give them their pound of flesh and let the pundits mutter amongst themselves.

So, without further ado, here are video links to four of the five Clinton interviews today:

Hillary on ABC This Week:
http://abcnews.go.com/Video/playerIndex? id=3639624

Hillary on FOX News Sunday:
http://www.foxnews.com/video2/player06.h tml?092307/092307_fns_clinton&FNS&am p;Hillary%20Clinton%20on%20%27FNS%27& ;acc&Politics&-1&News&10 28&&&new

Hillary on NBC Meet the Press:
http://video.msn.com/v/us/msnbc.htm?g=f3 39eb5f-2d46-47d3-b2f6-c7b6bc5cb9a6&f =00&fg=copy

Hillary on CBS Face the Nation:
http://www.cbsnews.com/sections/i_video/ main500251.shtml?id=3289208n

UPDATE: And a short snippet from CNN pushing back against the Republican nonsense about moveon.org:

How did "our girl" hold up against the onslaught? She took high inside fastballs from the best pitchers in the game and pounded extra base hits all morning. A tour de force performance. What a politician. Wow.

She used her trademark laugh to defuse the aggressive questions and stayed relentlessly on message. Here's an example as the second-generation annoyingly self-important pundit Chris Wallace tried to blindside her to start the interview by expressing feigned dismay (from frickin' Fox News) that the Clintons are so partisan:

WALLACE: Senator, in an interesting bit of karma, we are talking on the first anniversary of my interview with your husband, and I would like to show you a clip from that interview. Here it is.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BILL CLINTON, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT: You did FOX's bidding on this show. You did your nice little conservative hit job on me.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WALLACE: Senator, talk about conservative hit jobs, right-wing conspiracies -- why do you and the president have such a hyper-partisan view of politics?

(CLINTON LAUGHTER)

H. CLINTON: Well, Chris, if you had walked even a day in our shoes over the last 15 years, I'm sure you'd understand.

But you know, the real goal for our country right now is to get beyond partisanship, and I'm sure trying to do my part, because we've got a lot of serious problems that we're trying to deal with.

This week I rolled out my American health choices plan. I'm going to work very hard to travel around the country, talk about why we need to tackle quality, affordable health care for every American.

We've got to deal with the economy and some of the problems that people are facing in the mortgage market and the fact that a lot of people are not getting ahead.

In the last six years, the average family income has dropped $1,000. That's not good news for our economy or for real hard-working people.

So what I'm focused on is coming forth with ideas that I believe are in the best interests of our country. And clearly, around the world, we've got to restore America's leadership. That starts with ending the war in Iraq and bringing our troops home, but there's a lot more to do.

And I think it would be great if we had a debate on the substance, that we really talked about what each of us will bring to the White House, because I'm excited by what I hear as I travel around America.

I think people are ready to start acting like Americans again. They want to roll up their sleeves. They want to tackle these tough problems, and I believe we can.

And I'm confident and optimistic that we can make progress together again starting January 20th, 2009.

It's back, back, back, back....it's a home run! Wallace could only shake his head, smirk, and move on.

She did this, answer after answer after answer for five interviews. Her war votes. The HSU affair. The moveon.org ad. Health care. The questions were so predictable, any of us could have scripted them. Which is obviously what the Clinton campaign did in preparing their candidate. They didn't lay a hand on her. Just from a pure political standpoint, a truly stunning performance from a Pro Bowl caliber politician. Clinton knew she was eating Chris Wallace's lunch. There were times when it looked like she was fighting back a grin, she was having so much fun. She knew these guys had been dreaming about roughing her up all year.

This was a very significant milestone in the campaign -- the day she took her message national. Those of us who have been following the Democratic race have seen her skills for months. Much of what we heard today is what we've been hearing in stump speeches, Q&As, Democratic debates, etc. But, most of the voters (and most of the clucking pundits), haven't had the opportunity to see her formidable campaign skills -- the relentless discipline to stay on message with a tone of pure common sense and competence -- until today.

What did the pundits think? The panel on ABC's This Week was practically falling all over themselves. EJ Dionne, Cokie Roberts. It was like they had just seen Elvis. My favorite was David Brooks - Republican NY Times and Lehrer News Hour pundit. Looking like he had just received a lap dance, he stopped barely short of endorsing her right on the spot, gushing over how "presidential" and "serious" and "thoughtful" she sounded. About how she would appeal to moderate voters.

The response of the FOX panel was even more shocking. Of course, the two "weak-knee NPR liberals" (in Fox parlance) were impressed. But, Brit Hume (who has covered a few Presidents) could barely contain himself. Not that he agreed with her issues, but that her performance was so commanding. He knows a home run hitting politician parrying gotcha questions and staying on message when he sees one. He talked about how her charming laugh demolished Wallace's ambush questions. Talked of her command of the issues. Of her sensible, moderate positioning designed to appeal to general election voters. He summed it up by saying that, if she performs like that, she'll be formidable.

Of course, the every sanctimonious William Krystol (who came up with the Republican obstructionist strategy to derail any health care reform in 1993) piped up and said that Hillary's plan was still on the path to "socialized medicine". Chris Wallace jumped in and started arguing with him, "No it isn't. It's a moderate plan...". Huh? Are we in bizarro world? Brit Hume and Chris Wallace singing Hillary's praises like she's their girl, too? On Fox News?

Like I said, these pundits are like most of America. They only know the Hillary campaign from the sound bytes. This was their first opportunity to see her strut her stuff under "gotcha politics" pressure. They were, to say the least, impressed. They were clucking like the old barnyard roosters they are.

Which brings us to the real importance of today - mark it on your calendars as the day Hillary moved from world of diehard Dems and introduced herself to the country at large. The first time most Americans saw her smile. And, laugh. And talk about the mistakes she's made and the lessons she's learned. And her calm dismissal of partisan attacks. And her relentless focus on the issues important to real Americans in their real lives - like getting out of Iraq, health care, etc. Repeatedly challenging the Republicans to stop silly political attacks and start presenting their plans for heath care and the war in Iraq. With her unshakeable message discipline, she showed just how fluent she can be in talking about these issues. It was, as the Clinton campaign has always talked about, a chance for voters to meet Hillary for the first time.

It will be interesting to see the impact of September 23, 2007 on the Presidential race. My guess is that it was devastating to the other Democratic candidates and to the Republicans. I don't know the cost of five 20 minute slots on national TV, but it's millions and millions worth of exposure. Does it force Obama and Edwards to appear on these shows? Probably. Can they perform like Clinton? The Republican candidates, many of whom are probably getting their first look at Hillary, are almost certainly sitting back at campaign headquarters, drinking their dry martinis, and realizing that they have a formidable candidate to contend with in 2008.

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