Nomination Countdown- 2/16/08

Another week in Presidential politics has seen John McCain for all intents and purposes clinch the Republican nomination, while Democrat Barack Obama has the sort of momentum that now has him considered the clear frontrunner over Hillary Clinton. Nonetheless, the thinking is that if Clinton manages to convincingly win in Ohio and Texas on March 4, she could be back in the driver's seat.

In the meantime, Obama's expected, but impressively large wins on Tuesday in Maryland, Virginia, and the District of Columbia, which came on the heels of Hillary's "lost weekend" in which she was swept in several Saturday now clearly have the Clinton campaign reeling and even some of her "superdelegates" now appear ready to bail to Obama rather than theoretically going against the wishes of the voters at the Democrat Convention this summer. This coming Tuesday is expecting to see even more victories for Obama in Hawai'i, where he spent most of his youth, and in Wisconsin, although polls indicate that state could be close. These additional Obama wins should continue to feed into his perceived momentum and add to his lead in pledged delegates, but Clinton is expected to become even more aggresive in opposing Obama, on the stump, in paid tv ads, and in face to face debates. She is looking ahead to Ohio and Texas, where she currently has large leads in most polls and where the electorate might be more to her advantage. The Obama campaign will hope that momentum along with continued exposure will propel them to potential wins, or at least mere narrow losses in those states as well.

For his part, John McCain now appears to be expecting to face Obama in the fall, based on the way he seemed to target the Illinois Senator in victory remarks, after he as well swept the Potomac contests on Tuesday. There was some buzz that Virginia might have really tightened up for Republicans and could be a nailbaiter on Election Night, but McCain did manage by a fairly substantial margin. Any momentum that Mike Huckabee might have had after wins last Saturday in Kansas and Louisiana appear to have gone by the wayside. In fact, Huckabee spent the day campaigning for the crucial Republican vote in the Cayman Islands by giving a paid speech.

In addition to McCain's good Tuesday, he has now formally been endorsed by formal rival Mitt Romney, who graciously called upon his delegates to switch over to McCain. With endorsements from the GOP Congressional leadership as well as members of the Bush Family, including that of former President Bush coming up next week in Texas, the Republican establishment appears ready to rally around McCain. He is expected to have little problem winning over Huckabee in Wisconsin on Tuesday.

I will keep it short this week. There is always so much that could be said about this race and every single in and out of of the campaign, but anyone who might be reading this (besides perhaps my parents) probably is enough of a junkie to have gotten all that political news elsewhere.