WASHINGTON (Reuters) - It was Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton’s first turn as a punching bag and her pummeling in a debate at the hands of White House rivals was a clear sign of things to come.

Democratic presidential candidates Senator Barack Obama (D-IL) (R) and Senator Hillary Clinton (D-NY) attend a political debate at Drexel University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, October 30, 2007. REUTERS/Larry Downing

With the New York senator holding a huge lead in polls two months before the first votes are cast, the hammering she suffered on Tuesday from John Edwards, Barack Obama and other Democrats was simply the first salvo in a concerted effort to bring her back to the pack.

“In many ways, that debate was the beginning of the campaign,” said Phil Noble, a South Carolina Democratic activist and Obama backer.

“For the first time, the contours of the political landscape for the next 60 days fully showed themselves. It’s going to be more of the same -- but probably even sharper,” he said.

Edwards and Obama took turns attacking Clinton’s honesty, leadership and ability to win the November 2008 election, and her responses were unlikely to build confidence among her supporters.

Her wandering and unclear answer to a question about driver’s licenses for illegal immigrants -- she never made clear whether she supports or opposes New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer’s plan to give the licenses -- opened the door for critics to paint her as cautious and calculating.

“That confusion at the end opened up an argument her opponents want to make about her candor and calculation,” said Cal Jillson, a political analyst at Southern Methodist University in Texas.

“They recognize they really need to start landing some heavy blows or she’ll pull away,” he said. “You will see more and more of this as the first votes get closer.”

Obama, an Illinois senator who has based his campaign on an upbeat message about the need for a new politics, had promised to toughen his criticism of Clinton.

He jumped quickly on Clinton when she was asked if she would push to make public her communication with her husband Bill when he was president and she said it was “not my decision to make.”

But he seemed much less comfortable on the attack than Edwards, a former North Carolina senator who pounded Clinton for flip-flopping on Social Security, trade issues and Iraq and questioned her Senate vote endorsing the labeling of an Iranian military unit as a terrorist group.

Edwards rejected her argument she was trying to pressure President George W. Bush into “vigorous diplomacy” to rein in Iran’s nuclear program.

“The way you put pressure on this administration is you stand up to them, you say no,” Edwards said.

Her potential Republican opponents also were happy to pile on the New York senator over her answer on the driver’s licenses.

Kevin Madden, the spokesman for former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, said Clinton’s answer “was emblematic of someone who is both dismissive of efforts to enforce our nation’s immigration laws and entirely unwilling to offer a straight answer to a very direct question.”

Clinton’s camp said they expected the attacks and were not surprised. The campaign released a statement questioning past condemnations of negative politics by Obama and Edwards.

“With each attack, Senators Obama and Edwards undermined the central premises of their own candidacies,” the campaign memo said.