I've been thinking a lot about the bizarre incident on Friday and how it in itself, and perhaps more important, how Hillary Clinton's reaction to it, might affect the Democratic nomination for president.

Certainly we've seen before how reactions to crisis can make or break a public figure's reputation and/or career. Hurricane Andrew's August 1992 landfall could have been a career saver for the first George Bush, instead his weak response is widely considered to have been a nail in his coffin; we are well aware of the way Rudy Giuliani's and George W. Bush's responses to 9/11 made heroes out of them, and how, subsequently, Bush's non-response to Hurricane Katrina 4 years later would serve as a tipping point for his presidency, confirming that the emperor had no clothes for those who actually thought he did. On Friday, the hostage crisis in Hillary Clinton's Rochester, NH campaign office gave us the first (hopefully last) crisis situation by which to judge any of the candidate for president on this intangible, but psychologically potent "how he/she handles a crisis" test. And if the media response is any indication, Clinton passed with flying colors.

On the subject of Clinton's D.C. press conference once the crisis had ended, Matthews and company were downright effusive on Hardball on Friday:

Roger Simon: She was pitch perfect, she looked presidential, she managed without seeming to spin this semi-tragic enet...she said all the right things. [...]

Matthews: Amy Sullivan, do you agree?I thought she looked like a president there, I agree. [...]

Sullivan: She sounded very presidential, her tone was exactly right.

These rave reviews were echoed in an AP analysis:

When the hostages had been released and their alleged captor arrested, a regal-looking Hillary Rodham Clinton strolled out of her Washington home, the picture of calm in the face of crisis.

The image, broadcast just as the network news began, conveyed the message a thousand town hall meetings and campaign commercials strive for -- namely, that the Democratic presidential contender can face disorder in a most orderly manner.

Larry Sabato agrees (c/o The Politico):

"It looked and sounded presidential," said Larry Sabato, director of the University of Virginia Center for Politics. "This was an instance of the White House experience of this campaign. They knew how to handle this."

That the crisis was outside Clinton's control gave it a rare quality in this era of hyper-controlled politicking, Sabato added.

"What's most important about it is that it's not contrived," he said. "It's a real event and that distinguishes it from 99 percent of what happens in the campaign season."

The best thing about this crisis is that it ended up with nobody hurt. The second best thing, from Clinton's perspective, is that it provided an opportunity for her to display qualities both widely associated with her (i.e. strength and composure) as well as qualities that are not usually associated with her (i.e. warmth and a sort of maternal protectiveness.) And while the Rasmussen Daily Tracking Poll has registered no perceivable impact of this event on the race, I suspect there will be one at least in the short term, especially in New Hampshire, where no doubt the coverage was far more prevalent. But will that impact be positive or negative? A view that it was a net negative has emerged from  the far and center-left:

From The Nation:

The incident in Rochester reminds prospective Democratic primary voters and caucus-goers that the front-runner for the party's presidential nomination is a celebrity candidate who attracts controversy, who is legitimately seen as divisive and who-- barring a major shift in tone and style -- will always campaign at a distance from the American people.

And The New Republic:

Stretching the analysis a bit here (hey, it's a Friday evening), I wonder if it also subtly reinforces the sense that Hillary somehow provokes crazy, extreme reactions among people in a way the likes of Obama and Edwards do not--which goes to the larger questions of  electability and governing ability.

I personally think this is a stretch, partially because at least one of the sources has a clear a bias against Clinton but also because it presumes that people react to crisis by making reasoned judgments as opposed to emotional ones. If we've learned anything from the way in which Giuliani and Bush were deified in the wake of 9/11 it's that people's perception of a politician's response to crisis doesn't have a whole lot to do with the reality of it. So, does it matter that Clinton's appearances only came after the crisis was over or that the crisis turned out to be merely a crazy guy with some duct tape and flares? I don't think so. For anyone who caught Clinton's press conference in real time, I think Robert Thompson, founding director of the Bleier Center for Television and Popular Culture at Syracuse University, nailed it (c/o The Politico.)

"You had one of these breaking news stories ... and so everybody was glued to the set. She got on TV and provided a sense of closure and executive cool. It is like how Giuliani used television during his crisis.

"There was a sense that this was a dress rehearsal of how she was going to deal with ... crisis as president," Thompson added.

I'll be interested to see the first NH polling taken since Friday night. My feeling is that we're likely to see numbers break in Clinton's direction, at least in the short term, at a time when she needs it most.