Math Looks Tougher And Tougher For A Hillary Comeback

If Hillary Clinton intends for any political comeback, then she'll be facing longer and longer odds. Right now she must win every remaining state between now and the Oregon primary in late May by a 55-45% popular vote margin if she intends to have enough delegates to win the nomination straight out. That sounds nearly impossible as she is likely to have two fresh losses in Hawaii and Wisconsin to Obama, making it 10 wins in row, and raising her needed popular vote wins to a staggering 57%-43% margin in all remaining states. If she losses one more contest among any of the remaining states, then she will need to garner over 60% of the vote in all remaining states.

The hard fact is that Clinton has had few 55% wins so far before the huge Omama bandwagon of momentum really started to steamroll over her campaign in 8 straight states. Only in Arkansas did she capture a huge 70% of the vote. In Michigan she captured 55%. In Florida it was merely 50%. And in her New York it was 57%. But in most other states her share of the vote was less than 55%, including Tennessee at 54%, Massachusetts 56%, New Jersey 54%, Oklahoma 55%, California 52% and Arizona 51%. However since the latest string of eight straight wins by Obama, Clinton has managed no better than a mere 37% of the vote as her latest high-water mark. And her campaign is reeling from dwindling new cash donations and management changes which are only further serious signs of trouble.

A new poll published in Rasmussen does Clinton the lead in Ohio, but how long that lasts as the Obama tidalwave washes away her hopes is a good question? Rasmussen also found Obama leading her nationally by five points for the first time ever yesterday. Likely this margin is only likely to grow in the coming days as Obama is able to close the door on the Clinton campaign.

While the Obama lead in pledged delegates is still small at this point, it is important to look at all the factors involved in his new wave of strength and see that Obama has made inroads into every demographic that supported Clinton in previous primary events. It was only her strengh among those in the Hispanic community that really glued together her wins in some big states like California. As Obama trims her support even among Hispanics, her ability to win even Texas looks a little less hopeful than only days ago.

It certainly looks more and more difficult for Clinton to recapture her footing in the race. Part of her problem came from constantly changing her message starting from a Michael Dukakislike one of her claimed inevitability of winning the Democratic nomination, to a desperate me-too attempt of adopting the "change" message after she only seemed to promise an old guard return to a 1990's Clinton Administration type rule once again with her "experience" message. Obama by contrast stayed with his "change" message, and awed large crowds with a hopeful and forward looking message, where it was certainly far more inspirational than the Clinton message of wanting to basicly restore the old 1990's Clinton rule with her replacing her husband as president this time around. That hardly failed to unite supporters anywhere near as well as the hopeful Obama message or lure supporters.

Clinton certainly managed to allow a stronger candidate such as Obama with a more powerful and more inspirational message a clear opening to exploit and more likely capture the Democratic nomination. Likely Clinton will have many years to think about what went wrong and ruined her best shot at ever winning the White House.