News Analysis: Clinton's victory doesn't do much for her odds

The same crucial questions remain for her -- and for the superdelegates expected to decide the nomination.
By Peter Wallsten
Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

April 23, 2008

WASHINGTON — Pennsylvania voters Tuesday gave Hillary Rodham Clinton every reason to continue her campaign for president.

But they did not present any definitive new evidence that would compel Democratic Party elders to step in and anoint Clinton as their White House nominee, particularly when Barack Obama continues to lead in the overall delegate count and in the popular vote.

Instead, despite a grueling and often bitter campaign, Clinton's victory Tuesday left in play the same questions that remained seven weeks ago after her 10-point victory in Ohio, another large and politically important industrial state.

What does it portend for the fall campaign that Obama is not winning working-class whites, a crucial swing voting bloc, in the Democratic primaries? Or that he has lost most of the biggest states to Clinton?

How much credit should the party elders -- the superdelegates who are expected to select the nominee by providing the final votes needed for victory -- give Obama for drawing new voters to the polls? Or for energizing younger voters and for spurring massive turnout among African Americans?

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