This race is still very tight.
The delegate count: The NBC News Hard Count is Obama 1,192, Clinton 1,036.
Obama picked up two more superdelegates last night and this morning bringing
the superdelegate total to Clinton 254, Obama 203. (Since Feb. 5, Obama has
picked up 33; Clinton has lost a net of six.) That’s a grand total of
Obama 1,395, Clinton 1,290. So when you include superdelegates into the mix,
Obama has a 105-delegate lead. – First
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No one is doubting Obama’s string of victories. He’s had a powerful string
of wins. In some aspects, the general has already begun, with McCain and Obama
taking jabs at one another, leaving Clinton out. To be certain, Clinton needs
wins next Tuesday, not big ones, but she needs to win Texas, Ohio and, say,
Rhode Island as well.
But Jonathan Alter’s column
urging Clinton to get out of the race continues to seem vastly overwrought.
If Hillary Clinton wanted a graceful exit, she’d drop out now—before
the March 4 Texas and Ohio primaries—and endorse Barack Obama. This
would be terrible for people like me who have been dreaming of a brokered
convention for decades. For selfish reasons, I want the story to stay compelling
for as long as possible, which means I’m hoping for a battle into June for
every last delegate and a bloody floor fight in late August in Denver. But
to withdraw this week would be the best thing imaginable for Hillary’s political
career. She won’t, of course, and for reasons that help explain why she’s
in so much trouble in the first place.Withdrawing would be stupid if Hillary had a reasonable chance to win chance
to win the nomination, but she doesn’t. … ..
This is the type of drivel that should embarrass Newsweek: But imagine
if, instead of waiting to be marginalized or forced out, Hillary decided to
defy the stereotype we have of her family? … .. The conventional view is that
the Clintons approach power the way hard-core gun owners approach a weapon—they’ll
give it up only when it’s wrenched from their cold, dead fingers. … ..
Oh, by all means, Jonathan, Clinton should get out on the basis of blowing
away the “conventional view” of “her family,” never mind
that it was the traditional media that helped create this image of the Clinton’s
in the first place.
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