One of the Washington Post's cover stories on the Tuesday's results wonderfully describes the current state of the Democratic race: a candidate who is still quite unlikely to get the nomination. Not only that, she will go negative and try to present her opponent as "risky."
This narrative is the most realistic, and should be pressed by the Obama camp.
To quote from the article:
But as she vowed to keep campaigning, the tight vote in Texas signaled she may yet face a tough decision in coming weeks. The slim margin in the Texas popular vote and an additional caucus process in which she trailed made clear that she would not win enough delegates to put a major dent in Sen. Barack Obama's lead. And regardless of the results, she emerged from the crucible of Ohio and Texas with a campaign mired in debt and riven by dissension.
Clinton plans to use her triumphs in Ohio and Texas, as well as in Rhode Island, to argue that she still has a credible claim to the Democratic nomination, despite the delegate math. Many in her circle believe she finally recaptured momentum on the campaign trail in recent days and managed to put Obama on the defensive by questioning his readiness to serve as commander in chief.
So basically, she has done nothing to stop Obama's lead, and not only that, she is still in debt with campaign management problems. Interesting background to a "Hillary takes Ohio and Texas primaries" headline, huh?
And her strategy at this point is argue to the nation he would be bad for America's security and unfit to be president! Great, Clinton, now if he DOES become our nominee, you will have convinced thousands of voters NOT to vote for the Democrats without any the Republicans spending a dime!
Critical to Clinton's prospect of victory are the superdelegates... Her campaign envisions what aides call a "buyer's remorse" strategy of raising enough doubts about the first-term senator from Illinois through increasingly vigorous attacks and tougher media scrutiny to convince the superdelegates that it would be too risky to nominate him.
Wonderful! That's what we need in this primary season! Vigorous attacks! Let's make our candidates "risky."
But the Washington Post article points out the sad truth for her:
"Her durability is impressive if not astonishing, but she is still looking at some pretty cold, hard numbers in the race," said Jim Jordan, a Democratic strategist who initially ran the 2004 primary campaign of Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.). "She's running out of time, she's running out of space." He described a Clinton nomination even with wins in Texas and Ohio as "impossible, really."
Steve McMahon, another Democratic strategist who is not working for either candidate, said the odds are long. "It's difficult to see how the math works for Senator Clinton," he said. "If you look at most models out there circulating, the one thing that's consistent is that she has to perform pretty strongly in order to have any hope of making up the deficit among elected delegates."
As the prospects of a nomination become smaller and smaller, Clinton will slash and burn the party's prospects more and more.
The day after an impressive Ohio victory, but a weak showing in Texas, this kind of article spells it all out.