Read more reactions from Huffington Post bloggers to the Pennsylvania Primary results
Hillary Clinton has, as expected, won the Pennsylvania primary, matching our pre-election polling exactly by garnering a 10-point victory. Now, let the analysis begin.
Let me start with the observation that Hillary Clinton did not win Pennsylvania by running a negative campaign. The negatives that came out against Barack Obama were self-inflicted mistakes - his comment about "bitter" Pennsylvanians, his bobbling of questions over why he sometimes does not wear an American flag pin in his lapel, and lingering questions about his Chicago pastor, the Reverend Jeremiah Wright. He compounded his trouble by going negative against Clinton, because in doing so he took himself off his core message of hope, change, and the promise of a new kind of politics. He became just another politician.
And coming under the heading of "Things I Didn't Need," these multiple negative issues cropped up against him all at the same time, when he was already running in a state where the demographics were stacked against him. Pennsylvania was never realistically a winner for Obama anyway, but he may have done some damage to himself by responding the way he did. We do not yet know.
But political observers know there are ebbs and flows to every campaign and every race, and Obama is now in an ebb. However, he has shown a resiliency throughout this year, and if he can get back to his core campaign messages of hope and change, he may be able to make a full recovery.
Our polling in recent months has consistently shown that American voters want a leader who can competently manage the federal government, be an effective commander in chief, be one who can cross the aisle and unify the country, and be someone who can change the way politics is played in Washington. Obama appealed effectively to those voters earlier this year, and his challenge is to get back to that message while managing attacks from the Clinton campaign.
It would be a colossal error for the Obama campaign to respond to attacks by lashing out at the Clintons and dragging their old scandals back out into the public square. Exit polling from Pennsylvania shows that a significant percentage of Clinton supporters -- 43% -- would either vote for Republican John McCain in a general election match-up against Barack Obama, or would stay home, and Obama is not going to win those Clinton voters over to his team by bringing all the old Clinton scandals back to life. And should he win the nomination, he will desperately need those supporters.
Make no mistake -- the Clinton win in Pennsylvania puts the burden of proof back on the shoulders of Obama, who must show white ethnic voters that he is worthy of their support. He did this effectively in Wisconsin earlier this year, and he must do it again in Indiana. They were evaluating him in Pennsylvania, and he closed the gap with Clinton in the week before the election, but he was unable to close the deal with them for the reasons I mentioned above.
And his trouble winning the big primary elections could become a problem for him, particularly in the minds of super delegates who might wonder if he is too weak to win these key Midwestern states in the general election. It is certainly an argument the Clinton campaign will continue to make, bolstered by fresh evidence from Pennsylvania, and he almost certainly must win Indiana to squelch this argument against him.
And this race is bound to grow more acrimonious by the day, as open sores become festering, open wounds between the two Democratic campaigns. For Clinton, the Pennsylvania win is probably too little and probably comes too late to help. I agree with everyone else who says the mathematics just don't add up for her to win the nomination. The longer she stays in this race, the more harm is done to the party. There comes a point at which -- and I don't think we are there yet -- she begins to do real harm to her own reputation and career within the party. The question she must ask herself is, does she want that? The danger is that by the time such damage is evident to her, it could be too late.
Read more reactions from Huffington Post bloggers to the Pennsylvania Primary results
how in the world can any one with any idea of fairness say that questioning of Obama during the ABC tabloid debate was self-inflicted? Ae kidding me about the nonsense about his flag lape-pin and patriotism or do the people with the media microphones really belive that we are all that dumb?
Remember hope springs eternally.
Hilary is envy of you and it shows.
Every man has his price.
Dig up some more pictures or videos. They tell the story.
They’ve got enough on Rev Wright.
I know there have been times she made you feel like crying. But every tear comes with a smile.
Hilary’s clouds have gathered. Now you be the storm.
Never give up hope.
Always remember. New day new fate.
Obama “ YES WE CAN”
Are you claiming that the other non-white voters are not important - this is so annoying about the blantant degradation of voters of other races
Will it always be the case that for black people, you always need to work twice as hard to get the same respect as white people?
How come these questions where never raised when Obama won the Wiscosin primary and other states that have less than 1% of the blacks in their populatio? Such hyochrisy?
As the narrative that Obama is not responsible for his miscues or his own baggage...and is merely the victim of the evil and scurrilous "Clinton smear machine" becomes less and less plausible, more and more voters (and presumably Superdeleagates) may come to see him as less a messianic "movement leader" and more a conventional politician running for office, which would not be an altogether bad thing in my view.
I'll admit I'm quite partisan and I want very much to see a Democratic President inaugurated next January.
As such, I find the mind set that says Obama has no faults, and all he need do is run out the clock on Sen. Clinton, accept the nomination, (coronation?) and proceed to the "cakewalk" general election campaign a very dangerous line of thinking.
For Obama's sake (and that of our nation and our planet) I hope he has someone on his staff that can tell him the hard truths and provide the insightful analysis that Mr. Zogby has here.............tm
"Are you on crack?" is a balanced response.
Barack Obama is winning. He hasn't 'closed the deal" because 1/3 of the votes won't be cast until August, making it impossible for him to get the absolute majority Hillary Clinton now pretends he should have. Once he gets that, Hillary will declared that he hasn't 'closed the deal' because he hasn't yet walked on water.
Obama does, however, posess an absolute majority of the votes which have been cast so far, leaving him with a lead that is now insurmountable by any means short of the miraculous.
For one thing Obama lost by a lot less than predicted (hardly the double digit win that Clinton so desperately longed for)...in spite of the "perceived " gaffes and glitches in his own campaign,
and the very relentless hair-splitting by the Clinton team over Obama's "bitter" remarks...which happen to actually be true. (Bill Clinton said essentially the same things back in '91.)
In one year from now there will be whole lot more bitter God-fearing gun owning Americans. (Gasoline will probably be at $5 .50 or $6.00 per gallon by April '09. That will certainly have a devastating effect on food prices...making it increasingly harder for working Americans to "put food on their families" as George W. Bush one observed.
The People who voted for Clinton the other day are, I believe good people. They are also, unfortunately, largely ill-informed (some racist) who suffer from a inability to discern truth from bullsh*t...or they would instinctively understand that Hillary Clinton could not possibly care less about their long-term well-being.
For one thing, when Hillary sets out to "obliterate" Iran, it will be the sons and daughters of hard working, not so affluent families from places like rural Pennsylvania that will be doing the dirty work...coming home broken or dead.
Has that imbecilic wench even considered the global consequences of irradiating Iranian oil?
Is she planning to become President of the Thunderdome?
[Where is it written that only certain big states decide a vote? If only 25% of the people in the handful of big states vote during the GE -- the ones 20th C-thinking Clinton touts as the only ones that matter -- but 60% - 70% of those who occupy the smaller states come out to vote, which hasn't happened but very well could in this remarkable year, then what does that do to your metric?]
I'm as white as they come, but I am smelling racism now all over the Democratic nomination race, AND I DON'T LIKE IT. And what I find particularly galling is that I should somehow honor the covert racism of a bunch of 'older working white folk with a high-school education' as indicative of the strength of the Democratic Party. Excuse me, but no. That is not going to happen. I may be in their age group, but they dont set the standards of my humanity.
Where is the game changer?
HILLARY is the candidate with the racial divide, not Obama.
Hillary and her backroom supporters don't have anything else to attack Obama with so they are going for his character - they knew that if they threw in non-political personal issues it would ignite bigotry in places in Pa. referred to by her supporters as Alabama - Frankly, because of all this bigotry, Obama can't win - Hillary won't win because she won't have the black support to win - McCain and his backroom supporters are going to continue the bigotry and McCain will win because the majority of america do not like Hillary -