Hillary Wins the Pennsylvania Primary

"Not so fast, Obama. I just won Pennsylvania, and the train is leaving the station."


As predicted, Hillary Clinton defeated Barack Obama in the Pennsylvania Primary tonight by 10 percentage points and over 200,000 votes. Thus, she succeeded in prolonging the primary and putting her party deeper into a quandry. While it is theoretically possible that she could catch Obama in the popular vote (with the help of Florida and Michigan), Obama still is almost certain to win the voter delegate count. Only the Superdelegates can put Hillary into the lead in that crucial category.

In the days leading up to today's primary vote, Mrs Clinton's husband again embarrassed himself and his wife. Yesterday, he told a radio audience in Pennsylvania that Obama had played the race card against him. Today, the former president angrily denied to a reporter that he had said any such thing.

Hillary, for her part, appeared this week on the Today Show and told Ann Curry in answer to a question about a level playing field for women that she was playing Ginger Rogers to Obama's Fred Astaire. (She must have read my blog about the Philadelphia debate, which featured a photo of Astaire and Rogers.) She then added that the most pervasive discrimination in the world was discrimination against women, once again playing the victim card.

So what does Clinton's victory in Pennsylvania mean? Is Clinton back in the race? In a certain sense, she can make the argument to the Superdelegates that Democratic voters are having buyer's remorse over Obama, expecially in the light of Jeremiah Wright, William Ayres and Obama's comments in San Francisco. No question Obama is sliding, if not among Democratic voters, then certainly among independents and would-be Republican crossovers in the general election. It may be true that Clinton has a better chance to win in the general election. She also can now argue that she has won all the big states except Illinois.

There is one huge problem, however, that will be very hard to overcome. If, indeed, Obama finishes the primary season with a delegate lead and probably a popular vote lead as well, would the Superdelegates override the will of the voters and give the nomination to Mrs Clinton? It may well be that they will conclude that only Hillary can defeat McCain, yet, if Obama leaves Denver without the nomination, what happens to the votes of the black voters who voted for Obama as well as the younger voters of all races who went with the Illinois senator? Without doubt, many of them will sit out the election or even vote for McCain. Why shouldn't they? They will certainly conclude that they have been screwed-and that their trust in the Democratic Party has been misplaced. After all, while many younger white voters have supported Obama, there has definitely been a racial split in this process. Superdelegates may soon conclude that Obama is unelectable, but if Hillary wins this nomination courtesy of the Superdelegates and/or the party bigwigs, Clinton would probably become unelectable as well.

In the end, I predict that barring a major scandal breaking, the party will conclude that it is better to lose with Obama and keep the black/young voting base than to lose with Hillary-and lose those voters in the process.