Posted: April 2, 2008 4:38 PM
Obama Outpaced Clinton in Super Delegates and Money in March
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In the four weeks since Texas and Ohio voted, Sen. Barack Obama has outpaced Sen. Hillary Clinton in announced support by super delegates.
On Wednesday, Wyoming Gov. Dave Freudenthal told The Associated Press he had nothing negative to say about Hillary Clinton, but Obama struck him as “incredibly smart” and someone who gives honest answers instead of scripted responses.
Former President Bill Clinton named Freudenthal U.S. attorney for Wyoming in 1994, a job he held until 2001. He was elected governor in 2002 and re-elected in 2006. The governor said he was impressed by the large, enthusiastic crowds that turned out to see Obama when he visited Wyoming ahead of last month’s caucuses.
“They paid attention and were riveted and reactivated, and trying to be part of an America that’s bigger than just their own self-interest,” Freudenthal told the AP. “And you hope that can work. Because something has got to dig us out of this morass that we’ve gotten into, where it’s sort of gotcha politics.”
Freudenthal marks the 11th super delegate that Obama’s campaign has successfully wooed since March 4, compared to just one for Clinton, according to MSNBC’s tally.
The last time a Western governor with a Clinton appointment backed Obama, Clinton strategist James Carville called him Judas.
With nearly three weeks left before Pennsylvania voters head to the polls, Obama has also picked up support from a few non-super delegates who might do him some good in the coming contests.
The endorsement of former Indiana Rep. Lee Hamilton, the top Democrat on the Sept. 11 commission, could boost his standing on national security. Hamilton is also the highest-profile Indiana Democrat to back Obama ahead of the Hoosier State’s May 6 primary.
Obama “champions the politics of consensus and not of partisan division,” Hamilton told the AP. “I think he is driven by the search for the common good.”
Across the pond, media tycoon Rupert Murdoch’s daughter, Elisabeth, is hosting an Obama fundraiser for ex-pats in her home in London’s chic Notting Hill neighborhood. The move is the latest twist in the complex relationship between the Murdochs and the Clintons.
In other fundraising news, Obama appeared to out-raise Clinton in campaign contributions in March — but both campaigns were well off their frenzied February pace.
Obama’s campaign pulled in at least $30 million in March, a campaign official told Time magazine on Tuesday.
Clinton’s campaign had not released March totals as of Tuesday. But a Clinton campaign adviser hinted to Time that her haul would be close to $20 million — an estimate that could not be independently confirmed.
The New York Times noticed Tuesday that Obama is “grounding his lofty rhetoric in the more prosaic language of white-working-class discontent” as he tries to cut into Clinton’s polling lead in Pennsylvania.
On Wednesday, the Washington Post also noticed the shift, noting that the health nut senator ingested hot dogs, french fries and even a few Yuengling beers to paint himself as an everyman.
“The consensus is, this is a pretty successful tour for Obama,” G. Terry Madonna, a political science professor at Franklin & Marshall College in Lancaster, Pa., told the Post. “He’s hitting the right themes. I would be surprised if this doesn’t move numbers.”
-- By , NewsHour with Jim Lehrer | Comments | Link
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IF HILLARY WINS AND OUR ELECTED OFFICIALS ENDORSE OBAMA --- COME NOVEMBER --- WE ALL NEED TO VOTE TO REPLACE ALL MEMBERS OF CONGRESS. OUR ELECTED REPRESENTATIVES NEED TO LISTEN TO "WE THE PEOPLE OF THE UNITED STATES" --- NOT TO A "WANNA-BE-PRESIDENT-IN-TRAINING WHO HAS RUN HIS ENTIRE CAMPAIGN ON LIES AND HAS TOO MANY TIES TO TERRORISTS AND ANTI-AMERICAN FRIENDS". We American�s elected ALL members of Congress, as well as state and local officials, to be �our voice� --- we are tired of you taking our voices away.
MAYA ANGELOU SAID: �Hillary Clinton is a prayer of every American who really longs for fair play. Working men and women have had their jobs snatched from underneath them, their homes snatched away from them. And what we need, I think, is a person, a President who can make a difference in our country. She intends to help our country become what it can become. She dares to say human beings are more alike than we are unalike. I watched her become interested in public health and in education for all the children. And I watched her stand. I have found the person I think would be the best president for the United States of America.�
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