I think we can all see how the night is ending. The confetti is coming down in Columbus, and Hillary Clinton is on to Pennsylvania. As a Pennsylvanian--Pittsburgher, actually--I am happy to have a chance to do more reporting on my state. But I am not sure the Democratic Party is going to like what happens from here on. "We're just getting started," Hillary declared in her Ohio victory speech. Translation: rough road ahead.
This race is going all the way to Denver, to the Democratic convention. There will be arguing, vicious arguing, about what to do with Florida and Michigan. What if they hold second events--do-overs--in June? What if Hillary doubles down on her criticism of Barack Obama's readiness for office?
I was just talking to one of Obama's top advisers, and he was picking through what happened Tuesday night. This is a hard-eyed, unsentimental guy, and he worried aloud that Obama is a prize fighter who can’t--or won’t--deliver the knockout punch. "Barack wants to win it the way he wants to--with some class--otherwise, what's the point?" But Hillary just wants to win, and is willing to be as nasty as it takes.
According to this source, the Clinton campaign's "red phone" ad worked in Texas. And in Ohio, the Clinton campaign was able to fudge the trade issue by focusing on the errant, pro-NAFTA comments of one of Obama's aides. The comments allowed Clinton to accuse Obama of being two-faced about the unpopular trade agreement. "We stumbled a couple of times over the last few days and it cost us," he said.
Here is the danger for Obama: a campaign based initially on an anti-war speech, and based also on younger voters who see him as a movement, and on a powerful yet vague critique of the "system," has yet to win over rank-and-file, working-class white Americans to his side. He also has not made the sale to the fastest-growing minority group, Latinos, who voted overwhelmingly for Hillary in Texas and elsewhere.
Hillary has found her voice as the meat-and-potatoes gal of the old school, and it still has potent appeal to Democratic voters. And it may have more and more as the economy falls into what could be a deep recession.
Despite the delegate math working against Clinton, this ain't over by a longshot.