Tuesday, May 6, 2008

Indiana for Hillary Clinton!

CNN just called the Indiana primary for Hillary Clinton!

(The New York Times has a piece up
announcing the Clinton victory.")

A moment ago, Wolf Blitzer suggested that "it looks like Clinton's going to pull this out by a squeaker."

But a win's a win, and no matter what
Adam Nagourney or Thomas Edsall say, this race is as alive as ever.

Why, for example, would Hillary pack it in now? Like the last few primaries, she'll get an infusion of cash at the campaign's website on Wednesday, and some of the key remaining primaries, especially
West Virginia and Kentucky, are expected to fall into Hillary's column.

Not only that, Clinton's benefiting from
further electoral fallout to Barack Obama from the toxic Jeremiah Wright controversy:

Wright was a new element; in Indiana nearly half of voters, 46 percent, called Obama's former minister an important factor in their vote, and they overwhelmingly favored Clinton, by 72-27 percent. Obama came back strongly, though, among those who said the issue wasn't important.

Additionally, Clinton won Indiana voters who made their choice in the last week, by 58-42 percent. She did markedly less well among those who decided earlier.

Key in Indiana were working-class voters; they accounted for a larger-than-usual share of the electorate, with 65 percent of voters lacking a college degree, compared with an average of 53 percent in all primaries to date. While Obama tried to improve his appeal among working-class whites, the exit poll found a 65-34 percent Clinton advantage in this group in Indiana (and 71-26 percent in North Carolina). She won them by 61-32 percent in all previous primaries to date.
These numbers will continue to weigh over Obama's head, as he increasingly looks to win the coastal elites in Boston and San Francisco, while becoming increasingly vulnerable to a general election rout to the GOP as large numbers of Democrats defect from Obama's shady socialist sham of post-partisan appeal.

But as I noted earlier, Clinton's team will be working up the "nuclear option," as campaign aides prepare the case for counting the Michigan and Florida delegations at the August Democratic convention.

Still, if I was advising Hillary, I'd continue to hammer on Obama's radical ties, his wife's polarizing personality, and his inability to clinch the nomination with a second Tuesday win in his neighboring state of Indiana.

I'll have more in the morning.

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