The show, as expected, goes on
Despite my somewhat facetious argument that Obama would be able to pull off a victory last night, the winner was the one conventional wisdom and polling had predicted. Still by a larger margin than I would have thought, which as some have said, is large enough to keep her in the race and too small to make much difference otherwise.
I go back to this chart I posted way back in the beginning of March.
Click for larger
If anything, Obama has outperformed the chart, winning more delegates in Texas, winning by larger margins in Wyoming and Mississippi, and narrowing the gap in Pennsylvania. At each point, Hillary's chances get slimmer as the remaining contests shrink in number, but I fully expect her to carry on regardless.
Barring a miracle, Clinton will win Pennsylvania, though probably not by the massive margin she needs, not that it will matter to her or her supporters. I also fully expect some variation of the “kitchen sink” fusillade in the closing days of the Pennsylvania campaign so that she can pad her victory by as much as possible. . . .
That means she stays in until at least the May 6 primaries in Indiana and North Carolina. NC appears solid for Obama. Indiana is less certain, but most polls favour Obama as well. (ed - actually, they're inconclusive at the moment, but I can expect Obama to pull his support up as he has everywhere else.) Obama takes another late-round flurry, but probably wins both, wiping out any gains Clinton made in Pennsylvania.
It would be nice if this decided the contest, but a look at the calendar shows that a week from these primaries is the one in West Virginia, which favours Clinton, and the week after that she has another solid state in Kentucky while Obama picks up Oregon. That only leaves Montana, South Dakota and Puerto Rico. Clinton shouldn’t have too hard a time convincing herself to carry on through all of them, continuing to complain about the Michigan and Florida primaries she once agreed were not to be counted all the while.
Basically, regardless how slim her chances get, it is pretty easy to see Hillary continuing to potshot Obama all the way to the convention in August, wearing both of them down to the point neither is capable of taking on McCain.
Short of some unusual event that causes Clinton's campaign to implode, the fight goes on, and on, and on. And Hillary has clearly decided to go with the Rovian attack machine style of politics now, using the excuse of, "the Republicans will do it", to satisfy her followers who would normally be disgusted at such tactics were the Republicans actually doing it. And Obama has had to start responding in kind, which is really beginning to fray the party:
Nearly seven in 10 voters said Clinton has attacked Obama unfairly, and half said the same of Obama's campaign against Clinton. Those are the highest numbers saying the candidates have unjustly characterized each other since before Super Tuesday contests on Feb. 5, according to network exit polls conducted with voters as they left polling places.
Barely more than a third of Clinton voters in Pennsylvania said they would be happy with Obama atop the Democratic ticket; less than half of those backing Obama said they would be satisfied with Clinton as the one leading the challenge of Sen. John McCain (Ariz.), the presumed GOP nominee.
Clinton voters also appear especially likely to say they will abandon the party if their candidate is not the nominee. Fifty-three percent of those voting for her yesterday said they would cast a ballot for Obama in a hypothetical November matchup against McCain. More than a quarter said they would vote for the Republican, and about two in 10 said they would not vote at all. More of those supporting Obama in the primary, 68 percent, said they would vote for Clinton over McCain in the fall, if that became their choice.
McCain, Bush, and the rest, must be laughin their asses off.
