Politics

How Obama Can Win

By Matt Cooper

There's lots of agonizing going on about what happens to the superdelegates. Should they wait until the Democratic convention to cast their votes or should they meet earlier in some kind of confab to get this thing over with earlier. This is leaving aside the question of how to seat the Michigan and Florida delegations. But in all of this something has forgotten. Obama can win by...winning. It sounds sort of obvious but if he can somehow overcome the Clinton advantage in Pennsylvania, this thing will be over. Likewise if he streaks through the final states, he will be the nominee and all the anxiety will be for naught. Obama himself wisely departed from the line of his surrogates like Chris Dodd and Pat Leahy that Clinton should get out of the race. You can't insist that your opponent quit. You have to beat them. It seems somehow forgotten in recent coverage that Obama can still do that. Three weeks is plenty of time to close the gap in Pennsylvania and while the Keystone state seems better for Clinton--more working class, no indies or Republicans can vote in the primary--it's not an impossible climb for Obama. Should he lose there, he can crush her in the remaining states. Then this thing is done

New polls show him surging in Pennsylvania. Nothing settles a contest like winning.

Full post as published by Portfolio.com: Capital on April 02, 2008 (boomark / email).