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 Clinton Set For W. Va. Win; Obama Looks Ahead
by The Associated Press
Posted: May 13, 2008 - 11:00 am ET
(Charleston, West Virginia) Hillary Rodham
Clinton had every reason to expect a big victory Tuesday in the West Virginia
Democratic primary as her campaign tried to use the contest to raise doubts
about front-runner Barack Obama's electability in the fall.
Obama, only weeks away from
clinching the nomination, has already turned his focus in tone
and itinerary to Republican John McCain almost to the
exclusion of his fading Democratic rival. He planned to spend
primary night in Missouri, a bellwether in the general
election.
The New York senator
campaigned, though, like it mattered and polls showed her with
a commanding lead in the Mountain State, as well as an
advantage in Kentucky a week later.
"I think Democrats across
the country tomorrow will be asking themselves why Senator
Obama - with all of his money, with all of the great press,
with voters being told he was the inevitable nominee - why did
Senator Obama lose West Virginia by 15 points or so? What does
it say about his candidacy at this date that he can't beat
Senator Clinton in a key swing state?" Clinton spokesman
Howard Wolfson told NBC's "Today" Tuesday.
Interest is keen in the
primary, judging by a record turnout of more than 70,000
people who cast ballots in person before Tuesday in the
state's liberal early voting system.
Clinton implored West
Virginians in four stops Monday to send her forward with a
convincing win.
"This may be the most
important vote you've ever cast," she told a crowd in
Fairmont. "Let's have a huge vote in West Virginia."
Obama made only one appearance
in the state, talking up his love of country and conviction
that veterans of the Afghanistan and Iraq wars deserve better
care from their government when they come home.
"At a time when we're
facing the largest homecoming since the Second World War, the
true test of our patriotism is whether we will serve our
returning heroes as well as they've served us," he said.
For only the second time in
many weeks, Obama wore an American flag pin on his suit
jacket. He has said he stopped wearing such pins routinely
because he felt they became a substitute for "true
patriotism" after the 2001 terrorist attacks.
In every step now, he's mindful
of the gathering struggle with McCain, a veteran both of
politics and war who will exploit Obama's short national
resume as surely as Clinton has tried to do.
Obama is mounting a two-week
tour that will take him to the remaining primary states but
concentrate on fall battlegrounds including Florida and
Michigan.
Clinton won both states,
although Obama had his name removed from Michigan's ballot,
and no delegates were awarded. Restoring the delegates is a
major part of Clinton's long-shot strategy for the nomination.
Clinton's last best hope is to
use strong showings in West Virginia and Kentucky to make the
case that Obama is weak among key Democratic constituents.
They are, most prominently,
blue-collar, white voters, an abundant proportion of the
electorate in West Virginia and a leading reason why Clinton
ran strong in the state.
A strong Clinton victory would
not materially change Obama's prospects nationally. But it
would lay bare the racial divisions and other polarizing
aspects of the protracted and often bitter Democratic contest.
Increasing numbers of
Democratic primary voters have become entrenched behind their
candidate and said they would not support the other candidate
in the fall - a rift the party is eager to start healing.
To that end, the party leaders
known as superdelegates have been moving to Obama's side, 26
of them in the week since he routed Clinton in North Carolina
and narrowly lost Indians.
At that pace, he would reach
the number of delegates needed to clinch the nomination -
2,025 - in three weeks, when delegates from the remaining
primaries are included.
West Virginia had 28 delegates
at stake Tuesday.
©365Gay.com 2008
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