Obama, Clinton look to next White House fights
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Sunday, January 27, 2008; 9:59 PM
MEMPHIS, Tennessee (Reuters) - Democrats Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton jockeyed for position on Sunday in a bruising U.S. presidential race after Obama scored a landslide win in a South Carolina primary tinged with the issue of race.
"I think (the result) speaks extraordinarily well, not just for folks in the South, but all across the country," said Obama, who beat Clinton by a 2-to-1 margin in Saturday's Democratic selection contest in South Carolina.
"People want change. I think they want to get beyond some of the racial politics that, you know, has been so dominant in the past," Obama, who would be the first black U.S. president, told ABC's "This Week."
Obama's victory, after losses to Clinton in New Hampshire and Nevada, gave him momentum heading into February 5 "Super Tuesday" Democratic contests in 22 states for their party's presidential nomination. Obama, a first-term senator from Illinois, won the first contest in Iowa earlier this month.
Clinton, a New York senator and wife of former President Bill Clinton, would be the first woman president.
She and her husband drew criticism for comments seen by some as minimizing the role of blacks in the 1960s civil rights movement and the importance of Obama's success in South Carolina, a state with a large black population.
The Clintons have long enjoyed support in the black community, and she predicted Democrats would unite around whoever wins their party's nomination for the November 4 general election against the yet-to-be chosen Republican nominee.
Republican President George W. Bush's second term ends next January.
"This has been the most intense election process I know of," Clinton told reporters. "It is a marathon run like a sprint. There is no stopping. There is no resting."
She left before the votes in South Carolina were even tallied to fly to Tennessee, a February 5 state.
REPUBLICANS FOCUS ON FLORIDA
The Republican presidential contenders, who held their primary in South Carolina last week, are focused on Florida's primary on Tuesday where a struggling former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani is banking on a strong showing.
