Pennsylvania Analysis By Two of the Best in the BusinessKarl Rove:
His words wear especially thin when he was dealt a defeat like Tuesday's. Mr. Obama was routed despite outspending Hillary Clinton on television by almost 3-1. While polls in the final days showed a possible 4% or 5% Clinton win, she apparently took late-deciders by a big margin to clinch the landslide.
Michael Barone:
And, as I noted in the same column, Clinton carries Jacksonians—the descendants of those Scots-Irish, Scots Lowlanders, and northern Englishmen who settled the Appalachian chain starting in Pennsylvania in the 18th century and heading southwest, ultimately to Texas, in the 19th. Clinton won 70 percent or more of the vote in 15 counties in the mountains, including the old anthracite country in the east and the bituminous coal country in the west. She won 74 percent in Lackawanna County (Scranton), the home base of Sen. Bob Casey, who endorsed Obama, and she won 79 percent in Fayette County (Monongahela Valley south of Pittsburgh). The latter is on the border of West Virginia, and the results here, as well as in earlier primaries in Ohio, Maryland, and Virginia counties adjacent to West Virginia, suggest that Clinton will win more than 70 percent of the vote in the primary there May 13. Sean Oxendine's excellent map makes this point graphically.
Barone points out that Hillary could possibly catch Obama in the popular vote total, if Florida and Michigan are included. Of course the Obamaniacs will squeal that it's unfair to count those states, and they have a point. And Floridians and Michiganders will counter that it's unfair not to count them, and they have a point. The idea that this is going to be over without lots of bad blood is a pipe dream.
