The Democratic race has brought many firsts. As the campaign moves into the languid days of summer (hello Memorial Day!), another first must be noted.

For the first time in my memory and possibly for the first time in American history, it appears the likely loser in a hard-fought political contest is trying to dictate the terms of surrender.

How else to interpret the “unity” moves on behalf of Hillary Clinton and those who supposedly speak on her behalf?

Let us summarize.

In the week that just was, Clinton implied Barack Obama was trying to recreate the 2000 recount in Florida or, alternatively, turn the Sunshine State into Zimbabwe.

How?

Because Obama is still awaiting a ruling from the Democratic National Committee’s Rules and Bylaws Committee on how many delegates it will seat from Florida and Michigan. Clinton made these assertions – privately derided as “absurd”, “disturbing” and “inflammatory” by senior Obama officials — the same day Obama’s chief strategist, David Axelrod, told National Public Radio camp Obama would be willing to meet Clinton more than half way if that would alleviate future discord.

Clinton’s position is that the delegates should be seated according to her demands, even though both states knowingly violated the DNC rules and knew they would be punished. Interestingly, Clinton’s camp says this punishment has already occurred. How? The states were deprived, in Communications Director Howard Wolfson’s own words, of “full-fledged primaries.” In what ways were they lacking, er, full-fledged status? Why, candidates didn’t campaign there and voters didn’t have a full airing of the issues, said Clinton’s chief delegate counter, Harold Ickes.

Both Wolfson and Ickes are consummate professionals and adept at pressing their candidate’s case with gusto. But in this formulation they systematically debunked Clinton’s entire case for seating all delegates on her terms and with no penalty. If the primaries in Michigan and Florida were not as real as the others, why and under what set of just rules should the DNC seat their full slate of delegates as if nothing untoward had happened? Why should two states that had manifestly inferior primaries be given full delegate privileges on par with states that followed the rules and conducted robust primaries? Why indeed.

Clinton’s team even went so far as to assert that the Michigan delegates currently flying under the banner of “uncommitted” don’t necessarily belong in Obama’s column. Huh? Uncommitted was the only non-Clinton alternative on the Michigan primary ballot. That’s because every candidate save Clinton took his name off the ballot to conform to the Iowa-New Hampshire-Nevada-South Carolina sequence sanctioned by the DNC. By what sense of propriety can Ickes and Wolfson assert that Clinton has claim on the only reservoir of Michigan delegates who verily screamed NOT CLINTON with their votes?

How this falls into a category of “party unity” I cannot say.

Neither, of course, can team Clinton because in this battle they seek not unity but advantage, as is their right. But once this matter is settled and Florida and Michigan are seated, the Clinton campaign will have, it appears, needlessly antagonized Obama, various party leaders, and Michigan and Florida Democrats who at this stage want to resolve this dispute with minimal discord. The next move will undoubtedly be Clinton’s as many Democrats fear she will follow-through on threats to stage street protests outside the DNC’s May 31 Rules and Bylaws Committee proceedings. What will team Clinton do in the name of “unity” next weekend? What indeed.

Also on the unity front, Bill Clinton’s assertion – transmitted by unnamed friends — that Hillary “has earned” the right to be offered by Vice Presidential slot on an Obama ticket. Earned the right to be asked? Ah, yes. Earned a right to have her decide the fate of Obama’s ticket. Notice, the 42nd President did not let it be known Clinton had earned the right to be offered a slot that she would gladly accept to improve Obama’s chances of becoming president. No. Only that she be given the chance to reject it, rendering Obama simultaneously weakened for offering and spurned by a possible Hillary rejection.

Then came word from Clinton’s finance chief Hassan Nemazee of nasty consequences should Obama not give Hilary right of “dream ticket” first refusal. Nemazee told Politico.com “…there’s a risk that if she isn’t invited on the ticket, Hillary’s political and financial supporters may not feel compelled to be as integrated and involved in the Obama campaign in order to provide maximum support that he’ll need to prevail in November.”

This might seem a bit gauche, but isn’t the first obligation of Clinton’s financial supporters – stalwart loyalists all – to help Hillary pay off her $31 million debt? And again the dangling verb “invite.” It sounds like: “If you don’t ask, we aren’t given the power to say no.” Can this be interpreted any other way?

Honestly, who negotiates in public for an offer they’re sure to accept in such a brass-knuckled way? A unifier? I’m not so sure. As to the “maximum support” Clinton’s political supporters might withhold, it’s worth pointing out that no fewer than 13 former Clinton super delegates have already switched to Obama (two of them former DNC chairs appointed by Bill Clinton). What’s more, the flow of super delegates heretofore “frozen” by the Clinton camp has been moving steadily in Obama’s direction — even after her landslide victories in West Virginia and Kentucky.
One last point on the financial end of things. Without a single PAC, Obama has raised more than $272 million and has $37 million in the bank. Add up his cash-on-hand and Clinton’s debt and you get $68 million. Just as a point of comparison, that sum is 80 percent of the $84 million Obama would receive if he accepts public financing for the general election.

It seems to me the Obama campaign, having come this far on its own approach to fund-raising, isn’t quaking in its boots at the idea of AWOL Clinton donors. They may well wonder if these donors will dare risk sitting out this race as an act of petulant obeisance to the defunct Clinton machine.

I’ve left Clinton’s grotesquely unfortunate comments about Robert Kennedy’s assassination to the end because, obviously, Clinton did not mean to suggest she’s staying in the race because Obama might be shot. That it SOUNDED that way is her fault and her fault alone. That it spooked and shocked and saddened many is her doing. Not the media’s. Not Obama’s. Hers.

There were a million ways for Clinton to fence off any talk of RFK’s assassination to make it clear to one and all that it had zero relevance to the length of this race. She did not do this. Instead, she rolled into a convoluted expiation on lengthy primary contests that don’t always undermine party unity (unless, one might reasonably observe, the candidate does all described above).

She also cited the historically inaccurate and long-discredited nostrum that her husband didn’t win the nomination until mid-June of 1992. Technically, this is true. But everyone who covered that race, as I did, knows that Clinton clinched the deal on April 7 when he beat an upstart Jerry Brown in the New York and Wisconsin primaries.

Brown was a non-entity in the early contests but rose when other challengers like Bob Kerrey, Tom Harkin, and Paul Tsongas fell by the wayside. Brown then captured the remaining anti-Clinton vote and rose to official irritant status but no one at the time considered him a serious long-term challenger to Clinton. After the April 7 primaries, the party fell in line behind Clinton, Brown never one another contest and the June California primary was anti-climatic.

There was no reason for Clinton to invoke the 1992 campaigns or 1968 campaigns. None. That she did and that she then rushed to a South Dakota grocery store, posing in front of bottles of condiments made the scene all the more forced, macabre and pitiful.

One would think in answer to the question, “Why are you still in this race?”, Clinton could have said: “Because 17 million people have voted for me and I owe it to them to give it my best until the end; hundreds of thousands have contributed to me in small amounts, especially lately, and I owe it to them to use their hard-earned money to make my case to as many voters as I can; I am running a race on behalf of all Democrats but also making a case as the first woman who has come this far and I owe it to history to give nothing less than my all; I’ve said it’s a core principle to seat delegations from Michigan and Florida and I will not waver until this matter is resolved.”

She could have said that. But she didn’t. The answer she didn’t give would have inspired unity.

But it doesn’t feel like that’s what this week was all about.

Obama officials tell The Bourbon Room the process of selecting a Vice President has begun but is in its infancy. It amounts, they say, to little more now than assembling a team to begin the process once Obama secures the nomination.

Obama officials say no one is yet leading up the effort but that party veteran Jim Johnson will be among those consulted. In due course Johnson may assume a more formal role and his early involvement signals he is more likely than not to land the post, should he want it. Johnson, who led the veep search process for John Kerry in 2004 and Walter Mondale in 1984, is a natural choice for advice and counsel, Obama advisers say.

“News flash, Jim Johnson may help us look a Vice Presidential Process,” said a one top Obama official. “He’s been around a long time. He’s been doing this since Mondale. There’s nothing official and all of the reporting about this is pretty rudimentary.”

Tom Daschle, South Dakota Democrat and former Senate Majority leader may also lend a hand in the process. Considering the historic nature of everything related to Obama’s transformation from candidate to nominee, there will be no shortage of volunteers offering advice and counsel. A hallmark of the Obama campaign has been its ability to assemble a smart, effective team, focus them on the task at hand and minimize in-fighting. It would be a startling departure from form if the veep selection process played out any differently.

Right now, all that’s being done is a team is being selected to review open-source research on potential candidates. “Anyone can do that, ” the Obama official said.

True, but there are practical reasons for team Obama to downplay what is unquestionably one of the most important tasks of his general election campaign. Obama advisers don’t want to antagonize Hillary Clinton’s campaign or its legions of supporters with premature talk of hunting for a running mate amid a still-active primary process. This is part of the balancing act Clinton’s continued presence in the race has imposed on Obama and his team, for the sake of party unity, is taking it in stride and trying to strike a pose of respectful patience.

But it can only play that hand for so long. The process of moving toward a running mate must be communicated, if even in the vaguest terms, to signal to supporters and the nation that serious tasks are being dealt with in their natural order — even if it means risking a bit of ruffled feathers in Hillaryland.

Two other notes….

First, much has been made of the Kentucky exit poll result showing 45 percent of voters said John Edward’s endorsement of Obama was “important” to them and that a majority of those supported Obama. This has led some to conclude that Edwards would be a good potential running mate and this exit data suggests he might have sizable pull among working class voters Obama has yet to attract. Obama officials I’ve talked to don’t see it this way. They believe the die was cast in Kentucky before Edwards endorsed and those who said his endorsement mattered were, in many cases, already Obama supporters. Thus, they say, Edwards only reinforced their preference. It’s obvious Obama’s camp didn’t think Edwards would have moved many votes because they didn’t send him to Kentucky. The Obama results in Kentucky were bad and there was no sense sending Edwards there would have changed the result very much — and Edwards may have been reluctant to hit the trail in what was pretty obviously a lost cause. In other words, Edwards’ endorsement mattered, largely, to a self-selected group of Obama supporters and did not, in the view of the Obama campaign, move mountains or even mole hills of votes.

Second, Quinnipiac has three battleground polls out today. In Pennsylvania, Clinton leads John McCain 50 percent to 37 percent while Obama leads McCain 46 percent to 40 percent (1,667 surveyed, 2.4 percent margin of error); in Ohio, Clinton leads McCain 48 percent to 41 percent while McCain leads Obama 44 percent to 40 percent (1,224 surveyed, 2.8 percent margin of error); in Florida, Clinton leads McCain 48 percent to 41 percent, while McCain leads Obama 45 percent to 41 percent (1,419 surveyed, 2.6 percent margin of error).

In the McCain-Obama matchups, 26 percent to 36 percent of Clinton supporters in each battleground state say they will switch to McCain if Obama is the nominee. Of Obama supporters, 10 percent to 18 percent say they would back McCain if Clinton’s the nominee.

What to make of these numbers? Team Clinton says is buttresses their argument she’s the stronger potential nominee. Team Obama, of course, sees it differently. They no longer pay any attention to head-to-heads with Clinton, but head-to-heads with McCain. Here they see a lead in Pennsylvania and within-the-margin-of-error deficits in Florida and Ohio. They believe once Obama becomes the nominee and Democrats stop dividing their loyalties between Clinton and Obama, the Obama numbers against McCain will inevitably rise. They say they are pleased, at this stage, to be so close to McCain in states they lost to Clinton and where they’ve yet to define McCain and court Clinton supporters in earnest.

June will be an excellent month to test this theory. As well as accelerate the process to find Obama’s running mate.

“Tonight, in the fullness of spring, with the help of those who stood up from Portland to Louisville, we have returned to Iowa with a majority of delegates elected by the American people, and you have put us within reach of the Democratic nomination for president of the United States.”

– Barack Obama, May 20, 2008, Des Moines, Iowa

As the Obama plane lands in Florida and the Sunshine State regards the Illinois senator for the first time in eight months as a candidate and likely Democratic nominee, a few observations on the Iowa victory party.

Iowa tells the tale of this nomination battle in three ways.

First, it explains what Obama won there and what Hillary Clinton lost. Most tangibly and tragically for Clinton, she lost an investment of between $20 million and $25 million in pursuit of a victory that turned into a near-game-ending third place finish. On the day Clinton won big in Kentucky and her campaign reported raising $22 million in April (a fulsome amount for an effort hamstrung by weeks of dour or dismissive press coverage), the fine print revealed the wreckage Iowa wrought so long ago.

Clinton’s now nearly $31 million dollars in debt. If you subtract the $11 million in Clinton loans, the costly Iowa misadventure appears the central cause of the debt crisis. A $20 million to $25 million investment in an Iowa victory would have reaped enormous dividends and ended this campaign far earlier with Clinton as the nominee. Her loss not only blew a hole in her finances, leaving her far less capable of sustaining a wire-to-wire contest the likes of which Obama always knew he would have to wage to win.

Clinton’s Iowa loss inflicted other costs in prestige, confidence, morale and purpose. It took a strong candidate with gumption and true leadership skills to rally the troops after Iowa and withstand the post-Iowa body blow of 12 consecutive defeats (a by-product of a strategy that bet heavily on Iowa and assumed deal-sealing victories on Super Tuesday).

In the fullness of time, Clinton emerged as just such a leader and much of America (save ardent Obama followers) came to see her, albeit too late, as more compassionate, human and likable than the lacquered figure of imperial entitlement they saw when the campaign began.

The second part of the Iowa story is what it taught Obama, his campaign, and most important of all, those who have come to support him. Iowa was an abstraction at first. As Obama said Tuesday night, expectations were low but possibilities were high. The candidate had to ignite a movement, his staff had to attract worker bees to sustain it and voters had to see within it a promise more powerful than the unexcitable (Clinton) or preferred (John Edwards began Iowa the race solidly ahead). All three things happened and important lessons were learned:

– Grassroots organizing at the community level can change minds and deliver votes.

– Technology can simplify fund-raising and minimize day-to-day costs allowing young staff to make decisions and get instant feedback from higher-ups as both ends adjusted to circumstances on the ground.

– The campaign could unleash the directed energy of young voters to do more than pass around e-mails and hunt for hook-ups. Top Obama advisers had no tolerance for merely “attracting” the young. They demanded work, lots of glamorless trench work and found, as they suspected, the slacker generation was more myth than reality.

– The campaign also saw its gauzy belief in “new politics” vindicated. Obama rose without resorting to the hour-by-hour attacks and counter-attacks familiar in most early presidential campaigns. His cool demeanor and confidence created a sort of contagion among his followers that, indeed, something was happening here.

This had a near-paralyzing effect on Clinton and Edwards as they both ruled against direct and negative attacks on Obama, fearing a backlash. Instead, Clinton changed the slogans and optics of her campaign almost weekly down the stretch and Edwards hardened his attacks and so narrowed his populist message he had no room to increase the size of his following to match Obama’s.

That brings us to the third thing Iowa did for Obama. It proved he could remake the mathematics of politics by expanding the known universe. It’s easy to forget now, but Iowa’s caucuses night turnout shattered every record and left veterans of the process as dumb-founded as if they had seen Martians buying Slurpees and Slim Jims at the Kwik-Stop.

By Clinton’s own caucus projected turnout models, she would have won with the people she moved on caucuses night. But she finished a catastrophic third. She hit her mark dead-on and failed miserably. Edwards exceeded his turnout projection substantially and still lost by 8 points.

Obama’s Iowa win set in motion a turnout phenomenon that has continued throughout this race and now gives his campaign something bordering on supreme confidence it can win in November.

Obama’s camp believes it understands the the reservoir of untapped voter enthusiasm better than anyone. They believe it because they explored it first, found its depth, navigated its turbulent parts and charted a course as a genuine new explorer often does. This will strike some as arrogance. But politics makes no room for misguided arrogance. In fact it crushes it.

Politics rewards seeing things differently, finding ways to turn that vision into a practical vote-by-vote, block-by-block, county-by-county, state-by-state constituency. If you don’t believe me, ask Karl Rove.

Obama learned how to do something fundamentally different in Iowa by literally remaking the caucus map. It is why he believes he can remake the electoral college map. Iowa is not America, but in this race it gave America a compelling look at an unknown candidate with a new approach and a tenacious desire to make it work.

That it did in Iowa is a debt Obama owes to that state and it owes to Obama. And that is what brought the two back together in the fullness of spring.

The following is Major Garrett’s interview with Hillary Clinton Wednesday:

Part 1:

Part 2:

Part 3:

MAJOR GARRETT, FOX NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Senator Clinton, great to be with you.

SEN. HILLARY RODHAM CLINTON (D-NY), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Thank you so much.

GARRETT: Thanks for your time. A couple of days ago you said, and I quote, “Senator Obama’s support among working, hard-working Americans, white Americans, is weakening again. There’s a pattern emerging here.”

Do you feel like you need to apologize for that?

CLINTON: Well, I was quoting from an AP article, and I certainly regret anybody putting any more meaning on it than that, because this has been an extraordinary campaign. Each of us has worked very hard. We both have nearly 17 million votes. We have attracted voters from all across our country.

And I believe that I have a broader coalition. I have won the swing states which we’re going to have to win in the fall, and I think that gives me a much stronger position to go into this nomination. But obviously we’re going to have to put together a unified Democratic Party and then try to persuade enough Americans to vote for our nominee so that we can win and take back the White House.

GARRETT: Can you understand how that phraseology might have sounded?

CLINTON: Oh, absolutely. I mean, I regret deeply that, you know, rather than my referencing what was I thought an objective source talking about how this campaign has unfolded, anybody would attribute that to me.

GARRETT: Let’s talk about electability. The Obama campaign likes to point out that swing states are also Wisconsin, Iowa, Missouri, Colorado, states that he won. And they believe that’s a very powerful argument for his electability.

Why is it not?

CLINTON: Well, I would argue that caucuses are much less of an indicator of electability than primaries just by the very nature of the numbers of people and the broader cross-section of people who traditionally participate. So the primaries that were won by both of us I think are a better indicator.

GARRETT: Let’s go to Missouri then. He won Missouri, though narrowly.

CLINTON: Right.

GARRETT: No Democrat has ever been elected, unlike West Virginia. You can go back to 1916. But no Democrat has ever won the White House without carrying Missouri.

The Obama campaign says why doesn’t that count in the electability equation that Hillary Clinton talks so much about?

CLINTON: Well, I think it counts for both of us, because it was essentially a tie. I mean, I won 110 out of 115 counties. He won five counties which were population centers.

Democrats have lost in 2000 and 2004 because we didn’t win in rural areas. And I think that is a really strong indicator, because I believe that a Democrat will win in the cities, whoever our Democrat is. We will win in the cities because cities often have more needs, they understand that Democrats are going to do better for them than a Republican will. And certainly the contrast with Senator McCain, who is not someone who has been particularly favorable toward helping cities, will be a big help to us.

Our real electoral challenge is outside of the cities. And so look at Missouri. Take Missouri as a perfect example.

I won 100 out of 115 counties. I won in places that Democrats have to win if we’re going to be successful in the fall.

I won Arkansas, which is a state that would be great to add. I won Tennessee. I won West Virginia. I think if you look at the big states that I also won that provide the anchors for electoral map, I believe my case is stronger.

GARRETT: Let’s talk about West Virginia. Two out of 10 of those who responded in the exit polling surveys said race was important to them. Eight of 10 voted for you.

How proud are you to have the votes of people who appear to be race conscious as they select a potential nominee?

CLINTON: Well, I think the vast majority of people in West Virginia, not, you know, 80 percent of 20 percent, but the remaining very large percentage that voted, didn’t say that that had anything to do with their vote. And I think that is exactly the way it should be. It shouldn’t have anything to do with their vote.

I would hope gender has nothing to do with anyone’s vote. The fact is that I believe people voted for me in West Virginia because they need a fighter in the White House. They need somebody who is going to stand up, take on the oil companies, take on the insurance companies, take on the drug companies, not just in a campaign season, but has a history of doing that. And they need somebody who’s going to help solve their problems.

So, they really made what was a very careful consideration and determined that I am more in line with what they think they need in their next president. (more…)

CHARLESTON, W. Va - No headline speaks louder about Hillary Clinton’s intentions now and for the remainder of the hard-fought, up-and-down battle for the Democratic nomination.

Clinton also declared herself the best nominee for the party and said she wants Michigan and Florida delegates seated and left no doubt that the Clinton threshold for the nomination is 2,209, the number that includes Michigan and Florida.

Clinton declared that “swing states elect presidents and we win the swing states.”

“You know I never give up and I’ll keep coming back,” Clinton said with a timbre and gusto that drew lusty cheers here at the Charleston Civic Center.

No one knows that Clinton will “keep coming back” better than Obama’s top strategists in Chicago.
Obama’s tactical move to leave West Virginia to surrogates (Sen. Jay Rockefeller and Rep. Nick Rahall) blew up in his face.

As the putative nominee with an earned media deluge of “he’s the nominee,” Obama nevertheless saw Clinton roll up huge margins in West Virginia and give Clinton not a comeback but a credible argument to continue (and that’s the best outcome she could have achieved).

West Virginia’s Democratic Gov. Joe Manchin told me Clinton’s end-to-end trek across the state earned her valuable respect and Obama’s forfeit treatment may have backfired.

Manchin said the shattering turnout here - possibly more than 400,000 - is not only historic but indicative of a campaign that’s motivated, energized and rallied voters to the Democratic cause.

Manchin said he will remain neutral in this race and announce his endorsement after all the contests conclude on June 3.

As for Clinton, Manchin said, “She’s earned the right to stay in this race.”

Manchin said he disagrees with Democratic strategists who believe the length of the campaign has hurt the party.

“We had three times the early vote (absentee) turnout and we know a lot of the new voters we saw today asked for Democratic ballots.”

Clinton made a point of thanking Manchin for his hospitality in the Mountain State and reminded all in attendance they were together in Manchin’s hometown of Fairmont (just in case anyone forgot).

Before the confetti cannons showered the happy hundreds below (unlike Indiana where after a dreary night of nail-biting the Indianapolis confetti cannons flopped), Clinton told the story of Florence Steen, 88, who lives in South Dakota and requested an absentee ballot to cast in the upcoming June 3rd South Dakota primary. The request came from Steen’s hospice, where her daughter delivered the ballot that Steen filled out to vote for Clinton as an answer to the memory of being alive when women could not vote.

Clinton announced that Steen passed away recently but that her vote would count and her voice would be heard.

For anyone searching for motivation in Hillaryland, this story is a window into her perspective on the history-making dimensions of this race. Florence Steen doesn’t explain everything and her vote can’t alter the seemingly irreversible math behind Obama’s equally historic quest for the presidency. But for a candidate given one hundred reasons to quit, Steen’s vote - freighted with history - keeps Clinton’s wheels turning and this campaign churning.

From traveling Hillaries (my nickname for her road press shop)

Pushing back against political punditry, more than six in 10 Democrats say there’s no rush for Hillary Clinton to leave the presidential race – even as Barack Obama consolidates his support for the nomination and scores solidly in general-election tests.

Despite Obama’s advantage in delegates and popular vote, 64 percent of Democrats in the latest ABC News/Washington Post poll say Clinton should remain in the race. Even among Obama’s supporters, 42 percent say so.

See the latest ABC News/Washington Post poll at http://abcnews.go.com/PollingUnit/Vote2008/story?id=4837828&page=1

For the first time since mid-February, Barack Obama closed strongly in heavily contested primaries Tuesday and out-distanced Hillary Clinton in ways that defied expectations.

Obama’s camp felt internally that it would finish well in Indiana and North Carolina and the evidence suggests it did.

Obama’s pre-primary polling average in North Carolina showed an 8-point average lead for Obama. It appears he out-performed that average by a full 4 points.

Similarly, in Indiana Obama trailed Clinton on average by roughly 6 points. It appears he will outperform that average by 4 or 5 points.

This is not an outcome either campaign expected.

Obama’s campaign did not expect to win Indiana or fight Clinton to something close to a tie. The Obama camp also internally wondered if the outcome in North Carolina could be a low single-digit win or a margin of, at most, 10 points.

In both categories, Obama bested his own expectations.

This matters in the larger context of how the party will view Obama’s overall electability.

By outperforming his polling average in both states, Obama can credibly argue his out-organized Clinton and his overall message resonated even as he spent, in the words of  campaign manager David Plouffe, “two weeks on the griddle.”

One of the key questions is whether Obama won the “day of” primary, meaning that he carried the votes cast on Election Day. It’s clear Obama crushed Clinton in early votes cast in both states. A good portion of these votes where cast before the controversy over the Rev. Jeremiah Wright took hold a second time in the campaign and before Clinton engaged Obama in a debate over her proposal for a federal gasoline tax holiday.

This was a key difference in the Clinton and Obama strategies heading into these primaries. Obama’s camp worked overtime to solicit support in early voting. Clinton made virtually no effort on this front as her campaign, by necessity, focused resources solely on Pennsylvania to ensure the biggest victory possible.

This strategic difference was fueled in part by the monetary advantage Obama’s long-enjoyed in recent months.

That advantage did not translate into Obama over-performing his polling average in Texas, Ohio or Pennsylvania. It appears it very much did in Indiana and North Carolina and may bring Obama closer than ever before to closing down the long-running contest for the Democratic nomination.

The Clinton campaign is strategizing ways to persuade undecided superdelegates to back the former first lady for the Democratic presidential nomination and is laying the ground work for a public campaign to woo them to her side.

Clinton Campaign Chairman Terry McAuliffe denied any public effort to lobby undecided superdelegates is currently contemplated. But numerous sources inside the campaign and sympathetic to it told FOX News that a battle plan is being put together to use any and all possible resources to lobby superdelegates.

Among the ideas under regular discussion is to carry out public rallies, use direct mail and television spots in order to generate broader public support for undecided superdelegates to side with Clinton.

Part of the argument the Clinton campaign will use in this and every other outreach to superdelegates will be that the race is very close in terms of delegates and popular votes.

Clinton touched on this theme Tuesday night, citing the closeness of the race and the “he wins one, she wins one” nature of the campaign.

The other big selling point, also hit by Clinton tonight, is “to count all the votes.”

This is a reference to Michigan and Florida, which Clinton said shouldn’t be left out of delegate calculations, as they are now due to Democratic National Committee sanctions. Clinton said the nominee shouldn’t be chosen “by 48 states.”