|
By Yang Qingchuan
, Agence France-Presse
WASHINGTON: Though short of
declaring victory in the Democratic presidential nomination race, US
Senator Barack Obama of Illinois is getting closer to the ultimate
prize each day.
That is why he has largely
ignored the results of the remaining primaries and is looking beyond
to November’s contest with the presumptive Republican presidential
nominee, Sen. John McCain of Arizona.
For the same reason, Obama chose
Iowa to make a public speech Tuesday night even as he was competing
with rival Sen. Hillary Clinton of New York in primaries in Kentucky
and Oregon.
Iowa is a key battleground state
that the Democrats would love to win in November’s general
election.
Another sign that Obama has his
sights focused on the presidential race is that he has attacked
McCain more frequently in recent days, but had kinder and more
reconciling words for Clinton.
A new milestone
Although Clinton handily beat
Obama in Kentucky and did not do too badly in Oregon, the U.S. media
focus is not on the primaries but on a new milestone Obama has
reached.
Obama has won the majority of the
3,253 pledged delegates going to the national Democratic convention
in August.
By picking up at least 14 of the
51 pledged delegates in Kentucky, Obama has passed the threshold of
the 1,627 delegates needed to make that claim.
Pledged delegates are those won
by the candidates in the primary and caucus contests, as opposed to
some 800 superdelegates, whose votes are not tied to any primary or
caucus results.
Superdelegates are Democratic
governors, members of Congress and party officials.
Winning the majority of the
pledged delegates means that although there are three contests left,
Obama is already the choice of the majority of Democrats in the
country.
Combined with the number of
superdelegates, Obama now has 1,932 total delegates, compared to
Clinton’s 1,753.
A candidate needs 2,026 delegates
to win the Democratic nomination.
Within reach
As Obama bags more superdelegates
each day and can still win dozens of pledged delegates in the three
remaining primaries, he will likely be able to reach the magic
number of 2,026 on June 3, the last day of the Democratic primaries.
It is still premature for Obama
to declare himself the Democratic nominee at this point, but he is
approaching that goal by nearly every measure.
He has won 32 of the past 53
Democratic primaries and caucuses, versus Clinton’s 21.
He has won more popular votes, as
the votes in Michigan and Florida are not counted in punishment for
the two states’ violation of Democratic Party election rules.
Meanwhile, Obama continues to
pull in the backing of superdelegates, which is necessary to
formally put him ahead in the Democratic contest.
Among the superdelegates, many
former Clinton supporters are switching to Obama.
Even in national polls, he is
expanding his lead against Clinton.
The latest Gallup poll shows
Obama is currently favored by 55 percent of Democrats and
Democratic-leaning independents, to Clinton’s 39 percent.
He also has a huge advantage in
terms of campaign finance.
Obama’s campaign reported
Tuesday the Illinois senator raised more than $31 million. in April,
with $37 million of cash on hand.
That is in sharp contrast to the
$21-million debt of the Clinton campaign, which is unwilling
disclose how much cash is on hand.
Challenge to unite Dems
However, Obama still needs to
reach out to Clinton supporters to unite the party as quickly as
possible before taking on his Republican opponent.
The prolonged contest between the
two candidates has caused a rift in the party that will take time to
close, as exit polls from recent primaries shows.
In Kentucky, two-thirds of
Clinton supporters said they would vote for Republicans or not vote
at all in the general election if Clinton is not their party’s
nominee.
Of those, 41 percent said they
would vote for Republican candidate McCain and 23 percent said they
would not vote at all.
Just 33 percent said they would
back Obama in the general election.
These numbers are even worse for
Obama than in the West Virginia primary one week ago, where just 36
percent of Clinton supporters said they would back Obama.
Analysts say the right thing for
Obama to do is to give Clinton a graceful exit.
He extended an olive branch in
his speech Tuesday, congratulating Clinton for her victory in
Kentucky.
The Obama camp also avoided
demanding that she get out of the race.
Simon Rosenberg, president of
Democratic think tank NDN, said: “Everybody in the Democratic
family knows today that it’s going to be hard to put this party
back together.”
But whatever the challenges
ahead, the Democrats have a political landscape tilted in their
favor.
US voters are opposed to the Iraq
war, alarmed about the weak economy and convinced the country is
headed in the wrong direction.
“If the Democrats can’t win
with this deck of cards, I’m not sure we should win,” says Mark
Siegel, a former official of the Democratic National Committee.
|
