Hillary Clinton beat Barack Obama in the hotly contested Pennsylvania primary Tuesday 55 to 45 per cent [1], further prolonging [2] an already tense and extensive campaign to head the Democratic ticket for President in November. The winner will face presumptive Republican nominee John McCain.
With as much as twice as many voters participating in Tuesday’s Democratic primaries than in 2004 or 2000, exit polling showed that Clinton maintained her base of women, working class families and white men. She also won 58pc of Pennsylvania’s voters who choose a candidate in the past week. While the Tuesday’s loss was a setback for Obama, he still leads the delegate race by more than 150. However, both candidates will need help from the approximately 790 Superdelegates [3], largely made up of party insiders, to secure the Democratic nomination.
“Some people counted me out and said to drop out. But the American people don't quit, and they deserve a president who doesn't quit, either,” Clinton said [4] Tuesday night at her victory speech.
It’s hard to put a stake through this vampire’s heart, joked [5] Chive Turkey from Olly’s Onions, based in the UK. Yes, Clinton’s a fighter, admitted Gerard Baker blogging from the Times [6]in London, but he’s tired of the Rocky Balboa [7] cliché thrown around in Philadelphia. He’s got a better one: Clinton’s win means there’s going to be a lot more Groundhog Day’s [8] for both candidates.
With this in mind, most international bloggers concentrated on the future of this race where the biggest question remains: Will all the fighting and win-at-any-cost atmosphere that has developed between the two Democrats pave the way for a John McCain administration come November? Exit polling from the U.S. may suggest [9] so.
But Llegar a Ti, from Uganda, says arguments and attacks are a part [10] of politics. It’s not as bad as it seems claims the Angry African, a South African living with his gas grill [11] in the United States, who currently [12] refers to the contest between Obama and Clinton not as a slugfest, but a slapfest. Mary Fitzgerald at the Prospect Magazine [13] blog in the United Kingdom argues that while the Democratic candidates continue to dominate the front pages, relegating John McCain to the inside pages. She also points out they have also raised a considerable amount of money. Like it or not: no publicity is bad publicity. By designing their complicated and convoluted system of delegates and Superdelegates, the Democrats only have themselves to blame for the length of the contest, writes [14] Keith_London, who resides in London.
Outside of the Pennsylvania primary, Clinton made other news by admitting in an interview she would “totally obliterate [15]†Iran if that country attacked Israel with nuclear weapons. Kamangir, who blogs at Iranian.Com wonders whether [16] the world will take that message as seriously as it did when Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad claimed [17] in 2005 that Iran would wipe Israel off the planet.