The New York Times has a fascinating story this morning suggesting that the management problems plaguing Senator Clinton’s campaign provide a window into the management style she will bring to the Oval Office if elected.

The central point is here:

For all her years on the public stage, Mrs. Clinton has never come close to assembling and running an enterprise like the 700-person, $170 million-and-counting campaign organization that she has created.

This is a worthy question. And to many, it undermines Clinton’s argument that she’s the experienced Democrat.

But here’s the thing: In my estimation, Clinton’s reliance on her experience message has been one her most egregious strategic mistakes. There are several reasons:

• Her experience claim isn’t believable. You don’t have to read foreign newspapers or even political blogs to be suspicious of Senator Clinton’s claims of involvement in high foreign policy matters while she was First Lady. They just don’t pass the smell test.
• Experience doesn’t really matter that much in a Presidential campaign. Americans instinctively understand that no job provides sufficient preparation for being President. Over the years, we’ve elected a host of presidents, like President Lincoln, with only the barest experience. Americans seem to have (or think we have) a knack for divining whether a candidate has the right Presidential qualities. We get it right most of the time. Every so often, as we did with Jimmy Carter, we get it wrong.
• “Experience” is the last bastion for candidates who don’t have any ideas, and voters know it. Voters have heard it all before. Our bullshit detectors work pretty well. We like candidates with good, forward-looking ideas. And when a candidate — usually it’s an incumbent — hauls out the experience message, it’s usually to pick on a younger, more energetic opponent who has new fresh, new ideas. As a campaign tactic, this works well when voters are looking for stability and a steady hand, but when they are looking for a change-agent — as Democrats in particular seem to be now — being the “experience” candidate puts you on the wrong side of the debate.

To be sure, the list of the Clinton campaign’s mistakes is long and contains significant missteps. (Underestimating the importance of caucuses ranks near the top of the list.) But for my money, building her campaign around experience will turn out to be Senator Clinton’s greatest blunder.

UPDATE: Jim responds at his day-job site. Summary of Jim’s reaction: “Ummm. No.”