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Then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton checking her phone in 2010. For many Democrats, the answer to the question: "If not Hillary, who?" is disaster. AFP/AFP/Getty Images hide caption

Then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton checking her phone in 2010. For many Democrats, the answer to the question: "If not Hillary, who?" is disaster.

The back-to-back Clinton controversies are making Democrats queasy.

At a time when more than a dozen Republican presidential hopefuls are jostling each other in New Hampshire and Iowa, this should be a great moment for the virtually unopposed Hillary Clinton. She could be staying above the fray, using the time to staff up and prepare her policy agenda. But that's not what's happening.

Instead, she's fending off a pair of controversies one on her use of a personal email account (linked to a server in her home in Chappaqua, N.Y.), while she was secretary of state and a second on the Clinton Foundation's fundraising from foreign governments. While we await an expected Clinton "conversation" later this week about them, here are some reasons why Democrats are freaking out about Hillary Clinton's current troubles and one reason why maybe they shouldn't.

Why they're freaking out:

1. Democrats feel like they've just stepped into the wayback machine and not in a good way.

The revelations revive all the old 1990s tropes about the Clintons that there's always a whiff of "Pay to Play" in Clinton World; they're blind to appearances of impropriety; they feel the rules don't apply to them; and they aren't transparent. That's part of why Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif. one of the most important voices in the party said on NBC's Meet the Press Sunday Clinton should "step up" and explain the emails. Feinstein said what many other Democrats think that continued silence from Clinton will hurt her even more.

2. It won't go away any time soon.

The State Department will take months to go through the 55,000 emails Clinton has turned over to them (which isn't even all of the emails); congressional Republicans will hold hearings until Election Day; and Republican presidential candidates will be sure to keep beating the drum.

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3 Reasons Democrats Are Freaking Out About Hillary Clinton