Obama Campaign Sees the End
May 7th, 2008 at 11:29 am
The Obama campaign held a conference call this morning to echo what even most pundits said last night — that their candidate has all but sealed up the nomination.
Obama Strategist David Plouffe said Obama netted 13 delegates last night. He gained 17 in his sweep of North Carolina and limited Hillary Clinton to a win of four delegates in Indiana. That more than erases Clinton’s haul from Pennsylvania. Plouffe said Obama now leads Clinton by 172 pledged delegates (that’s the non-superdelegate kind) — the biggest advantage of the campaign. “A high water mark,” he termed it. Obama is within 172 delegates of clinching the nomination (ahem, superdelegates, please pick up the white courtesy phone).
Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry, one of five prominent elected Democrats who joined Plouffe on the call, described Obama’s performance last night a “giant and decisive step” toward the nomination.
One reporter asked if the campaign expected Obama to be “Swift Boated” in the fall. This seems to be a recurring fear among Democrats — that Obama will wilt under GOP attacks. Plouffe responded that Obama’s better-than-expected performance last night following a month of controversy shows that “Sen. Obama has a toughness and an ability to deal with adversity that will serve him well in the general election.”
Kerry, Mr. Swift Boat himself, chimed in with an important and oft-forgotten fact of 2004: that the Kerry campaign didn’t have the resources in August of 2004 to respond to the Swift Boat attacks. Because the Democratic National Convention was so early and the GOP’s so late, the Kerry campaign faced five weeks in which it had to conserve general election funds for October. This time, not only will Obama — like “all Democrats everywhere” — learn from Kerry’s mistakes and respond quickly, but Obama also won’t have the financial constraints of his predecessor.
Earlier this morning, the Clinton campaign held its own conference call in which they disclosed that Clinton had lent her campaign $6.4 million. Nonetheless, Howard Wolfson, her campaign spokesman said there had been zero discussion about whether to drop out. Asked if Clinton should end her campaign, the elected officials on the Obama call demurred. Sen. Claire McCaskill of Missouri said, “There is a sincere respect for Hillary Clinton in this campaign… This is her decision.”
McCaskill then added, “We’re confident that she is going to do the right thing for the Democratic Party.”
May 7th, 2008 at 5:07 pm
McCaskill is a lovely optimist.
Let it be.