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Clinton Aides Doubtful About Future
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The Clinton campaign has tried to sway voters and superdelegates for weeks by pointing to opinion polls that show Obama's favorability ratings steadily decreasing since his string of victories in February. His popularity hit bottom in recent weeks after Obama was quoted as saying that small-town Americans are "bitter" and with the airing of controversial remarks by his former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr.
But 64 percent of voters in Indiana and 69 percent in North Carolina said they would be satisfied with Obama as the Democratic nominee, according to exit polls, in line with the 69 percent who said the same in previous contests.
Likewise, superdelegates have continued to support Obama. In the two weeks since the Pennsylvania primary, which Obama lost by 10 percentage points, he has gained the support of about two dozen superdelegates, to the dozen or so that have backed Clinton.
Clinton's loss in North Carolina also pointed to an increasingly complicated dynamic for her campaign: More than 90 percent of African Americans, one of the most loyal factions in the Democratic party, favored Obama. That not only prevented Clinton from coming close but also makes it harder for her to woo superdelegates who would be loath to derail the chances of the most viable black presidential candidate in the country's history.
Rep. Brad Miller, an undecided superdelegate from North Carolina, said on the eve of his state's primary that he would be uncomfortable telling the African American community in his Raleigh area district that he would choose Clinton over Obama simply because he deemed her more electable.
"I'm not sure how I could tell them that," he said.
Clinton plans to continue to reach out to working-class voters with her plan for a gas tax "holiday" in the six contests that remain, but campaign aides acknowledged that changing the dynamics in any of those places will be difficult. The candidates are expected to split the remaining races, with Obama favored in Oregon, Montana and South Dakota and with Clinton given the edge in West Virginia, Kentucky and Puerto Rico.
Clinton's last chance for a big upset is in Oregon, where she will go Thursday, but she faces an uphill climb among an electorate that one of her aides described as "demographically polarized."
