What's really damaging Clinton's campaign -- perhaps fatally -- is the dramatic reversal of support for the two rivals by the party's superdelegates. Clinton's support, in fact, has remained static since Super Tuesday while Obama's has steadily grown stronger. Obama has added 21 superdelegates in the past week and Clinton has had a net increase of only two.
Now Clinton's superdelegate support is crumbling.
An increasing number of superdelegates who previously were committed to Clinton are switching to Obama, while the Illinois senator has yet to lose a single superdelegate to Clinton. Even the controversy over Obama's former pastor, Reverend Jeremiah Wright, has failed to dislodge any of Obama's superdelegates.
Kevin Rodriquez, a superdelegate from the U.S. Virgin Islands said in a statement that he switched from Clinton to Obama because he thinks Obama has brought energy and excitement to the party. "He has shown he can connect with Democrats, Republicans and independents across this country, whether we live on the mainland or an island," he told The Associated Press.
Superdelegates: We Have No Right to Repeat 2000 and Overturn Voters' Choice
Obama's milestone is important because Clinton would need to win over the remaining uncommitted superdelegates by a wide margin to claim the nomination -- and that's increasingly becoming impossible, as the trickle of superdelgates switching their allegiance from Clinton to Obama has grown into a torrent.
Even though neither Obama nor Clinton have won enough pledged delegates in the primaries and caucuses to win the nomination outright, there is a deepening conviction among the superdelegates that, although they're free to vote for whomever they please, the voters have spoken and the superdelegates have no right to overturn the voters' decision.
It's a fundamental principle of democracy: The voters have the last word. It's a principle that many Democrats will forever feel was violated in 2000 when George W. Bush won the presidency on the basis of the constitutionally-mandated Electoral College, despite losing the popular vote to Al Gore by 500,000 votes.
That bitter memory of the 2000 election clearly hasn't been lost on the superdelegates.
"I always felt that if anybody establishes himself or herself as the clear leader, the superdelegates would fall in line," said Don Fowler, a former chairman of the Democratic National Committee. "It is [now] perceived that he [Obama] is the leader. The trickle is going to become an avalanche."
Indeed, it's already happening.
Not Honoring the Voters' Choice Would Tear the Party Apart
There's also an unspoken fear among superdelegates that if they awarded the Democratic nomination to the candidate who lost the popular vote, the party would be torn asunder, as supporters of the candidate who won the popular vote would walk out of the convention and would punish the party in November by either staying home or voting for McCain.
That's a scenario that is giving party leaders nightmares -- especially with race becoming a major factor in the deepening ill feelings between the Clinton and Obama camps.
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