Ohio, Texas could decide Democratic race
By DAVID ESPO, AP Special Correspondent 54 minutes ago
WASHINGTON - Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton contested primaries in Ohio, Texas and two other states on Tuesday, the front-runner and his pursuer in a riveting race for the Democratic presidential nomination. John McCain reached out for the Republican delegates needed to secure his nomination after a decade's struggle.
In all there were 370 Democratic delegates at stake in Rhode Island, Vermont, Ohio and Texas, which uses an unusual primary-caucus system.
After 11 straight victories, Obama had the momentum and the lead in the delegate chase in The Associated Press count, 1,386-1,276.
[...] That left Clinton in desperate need of a comeback with time running out — if it hadn't already.
Some of her supporters, her husband, the former president among them, said she needed to outpoll Obama in both Texas and Ohio to sustain her candidacy.
Without conceding anything, Obama's allies said even that wouldn't be enough, given his lead in the delegate count and party rules that virtually assure primary losers a significant share of the spoils.
It takes 2,025 delegates to win the Democratic nomination, and slightly more than 600 remained to be picked in the 10 states that vote after Tuesday.
It's not the math that worries me, it's the stupid fucking media. Expectations and pressure have been unfairly raised for Obama, and the headline above is a perfect example. A knockout by Obama is not likely, and Hillary needs to win like 60-40 the rest of the way to catch Obama—and that's simply not going to happen barring some unforeseen event. But narrow victories or split results today allow Hillary to effectively declare resounding comeback status and climb back into a race she really still has little chance of winning fairly/cleanly.
Anyway, the reason I'm getting an ulcer over this is simple—Obama's my guy, and over the last couple days, HRC has released a barrage of attacks and they seem to have had an impact. A week ago, I felt pretty comfortable with today—not that Obama was a lock to win, but that expectations all around were more tempered, and that he could win Texas, and perhaps even Ohio.
Now that seems to be in some doubt, and the media has shifted the pressure from Hillary to save her campaign to Obama needing to seal the deal today.
Anyway, this is so nerve-wracking for me because I don't want Hillary to be rewarded for her tactics, and I will have a really hard time stomaching her as the nominee should that somehow come about. That wasn't true a month ago, but since then Hillary "found her voice" and it turned out to be Republican.
