The Hindu : Karnataka News : Obama secures a crucial endorsement

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Sunday, Mar 30, 2008
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Karnataka

Obama secures a crucial endorsement

Adam Nagourney, Patrick Healy and Jeff Zeleny

Hillary Clinton says she will not be “bullied out” of the race

The surprise endorsement of Senator Barack Obama by a popular Senator in a crucial State on Friday underlined the ferment in the Democratic presidential race and the serious obstacles facing Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton as she tries to rescue her candidacy.

Compounding the challenge, one of Mr. Obama’s most prominent supporters, Senator Patrick J. Leahy of Vermont, said on Friday on a radio programme that Ms. Clinton should withdraw from the race.

The Clinton campaign showed resolve in the face of the developments, rallying supporters and donors and enlisting prominent surrogates to fight back. Ms. Clinton told aides that she would not be “bullied out” of the race, and in a conversation with two Democratic allies, she compared the situation to the “big boys” trying to bully a woman, according to interviews with them.

Ms. Clinton said she was in the contest to stay. “I believe that a spirited contest is good for the Democratic Party,” Ms. Clinton said at a late-afternoon news conference in north-western Indiana a few miles from Mr. Obama’s house on the South Side of Chicago. “We will have a united party behind whoever that nominee is.”

The developments, including the endorsement of Mr. Obama by Senator Bob Casey of Pennsylvania, where Ms. Clinton seeks a major primary victory on April 22, occurred as uneasiness grows among Democrats over a race that has become closer, more extended and more bitter than expected.

In interviews, Democratic leaders said they were concerned that the increased tensions between the two campaigns, and the sharpening exchanges between Ms. Clinton and Mr. Obama, were hurting the party’s chances of winning the White House in November.

Even though Ms. Clinton’s supporters acknowledge that she faces a decidedly uphill battle against Mr. Obama — he leads her in delegates and in total votes — there is no sign that party leaders will try to end the race by urging Ms. Clinton to withdraw or urging uncommitted delegates to rally around Mr. Obama.

Ms. Clinton’s aides said they could see no circumstance in which she would withdraw unless she lost Pennsylvania, although two senior advisers and one close ally said they would urge her to quit the race if she lost Indiana on May 6.

In a sign of the forces roiling the battle, Howard Dean, the Democratic National Committee chairman, who has kept a low profile in the contest, urged both campaigns to ratchet down the rhetoric. While not assigning blame, he said that some of the attacks by the candidates’ supporters and surrogates would complicate efforts to unify the party after it has a nominee.

“The tone has changed in the last three or four weeks,” he said in an interview. “And the emotional content has increased to the point where it is in some cases unhealthy.”

“If we have an ugly, divided convention, we will lose,” he said. “John McCain is not a strong candidate for President. The only way we lose is if we are divided.”

Mr. Dean said he wanted the contest settled well before the party’s convention at the end of August.

He urged so-called superdelegates — uncommitted party leaders and elected officials — to unify behind a candidate soon after the last primaries, on June 3. — New York Times News Service

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