Hillary Clinton won the Pennsylvania Democratic primary on…

Thursday, April 24, 2008

Hillary Clinton won the Pennsylvania Democratic primary on Tuesday by a margin of 55-45%, sparking questions from the media of why it is taking Barack Obama so long to close the deal. He has a front-runner state, a majority of delegates, and is outspending Clinton by at least 2-1. Yet, Obama was only able to knock Clinton’s 20 point lead down to 10 points. Perhaps, Clinton is exaggerating a little when she called last night “the turning of the tide” (after all, there are only 9 states left for her to catch up), but the question remains of why Obama has not been able to close the deal yet. Why are there still undecided super-delegates? Why has Obama failed to win the states that were battleground states in 2000 and 2004 (e.g. Ohio, Florida, and Pennsylvania)?

First of all, one must understand that while Obama is ahead, he only leads by about 130 delegates, and is still 305 short of the magic 2,025 needed to get the nomination. It would be difficult for Clinton to catch up with Obama and pass him, but events have made the situation look more hopeful for her recently. In past weeks, Obama has come under fire for inflammatory anti-American comments that his pastor made. At a San Fransisco fundraiser Obama stirred up controversy when he said

“You go into some of these small towns in Pennsylvania, and like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing's replaced them. And they fell through the Clinton administration, and the Bush administration, and each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are gonna regenerate and they have not. And it's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.”

Obama has increasingly come under fire from both Clinton and McCain (the media is not doing him any favors either). Between this and the narrow margins in delegates and the popular vote, it is not surprising that Obama is having a difficult time. In addition, Pennsylvania really did favor Clinton demographically, with its non-upscale white Democrats and independents to whom Obama has always had a hard time appealing. We shall have to see what happens as the race now moves to Indiana and North Carolina.

Posted by D. Turner and C. Dalton