These are the kind of stories I love to read, taking an inside snapshot of the effectiveness of the Obama campaign, punctuated by the great skills of the candidate.  Read:

WASHINGTON (AP) - Unlike Hillary Rodham Clinton, rival Barack Obama planned for the long haul. Clinton hinged her whole campaign on an early knockout blow on Super Tuesday, while Obama's staff researched congressional districts in states with primaries that were months away. What they found were opportunities to win delegates, even in states they would eventually lose.

Obama's campaign mastered some of the most arcane rules in politics, and then used them to foil a front-runner who seemed to have every advantage - money, fame and a husband who had essentially run the Democratic Party for eight years as president.

"Without a doubt, their understanding of the nominating process was one of the keys to their success," said Tad Devine, a Democratic strategist not aligned with either candidate. "They understood the nuances of it and approached it at a strategic level that the Clinton campaign did not."

Careful planning is one reason why Obama is emerging as the nominee as the Democratic Party prepares for its final three primaries, Puerto Rico on Sunday and Montana and South Dakota on Tuesday. Attributing his success only to soaring speeches and prodigious fundraising ignores a critical part of contest.

 Obama used the Democrats' system of awarding delegates to limit his losses in states won by Clinton while maximizing gains in states he carried. Clinton, meanwhile, conserved her resources by essentially conceding states that favored Obama, including many states that held caucuses instead of primaries.

In a stark example, Obama's victory in Kansas wiped out the gains made by Clinton for winning New Jersey, even though New Jersey had three times as many delegates at stake. Obama did it by winning big in Kansas while keeping the vote relatively close in New Jersey.

The research effort was headed by Jeffrey Berman, Obama's press-shy national director of delegate operations. Berman, who also tracked delegates in former Rep. Dick Gephardt's presidential bids, spent the better part of 2007 analyzing delegate opportunities for Obama.

Obama won a majority of the 23 Super Tuesday contests on Feb. 5 and then spent the following two weeks racking up 11 straight victories, building an insurmountable lead among delegates won in primaries and caucuses.

What made it especially hard for Clinton to catch up was that Obama understood and took advantage of a nominating system that emerged from the 1970s and '80s, when the party struggled to find a balance between party insiders and its rank-and-file voters.

 Until the 1970s, the nominating process was controlled by party leaders, with ordinary citizens having little say. There were primaries and caucuses, but the delegates were often chosen behind closed doors, sometimes a full year before the national convention. That culminated in a 1968 national convention that didn't reflect the diversity of the party - racially or ideologically.

The fiasco of the 1968 convention in Chicago, where police battled anti-war protesters in the streets, led to calls for a more inclusive process.

One big change was awarding delegates proportionally, meaning you can finish second or third in a primary and still win delegates to the party's national convention. As long candidates get at least 15 percent of the vote, they are eligible for delegates.

The system enables strong second-place candidates to stay competitive and extend the race - as long as they don't run out of campaign money.

"For people who want a campaign to end quickly, proportional allocation is a bad system," Devine said. "For people who want a system that is fair and reflective of the voters, it's a much better system."

 Another big change was the introduction of superdelegates, the party and elected officials who automatically attend the convention and can vote for whomever they choose regardless of what happens in the primaries and caucuses.

Much has been made of the superdelegates this year because neither Obama nor Clinton can reach the number of delegates needed to secure the nomination without their support.

A more subtle change was the distribution of delegates within each state. As part of the proportional system, Democrats award delegates based on statewide vote totals as well as results in individual congressional districts. The delegates, however, are not distributed evenly within a state, like they are in the Republican system.

Under Democratic rules, congressional districts with a history of strong support for Democratic candidates are rewarded with more delegates than districts that are more Republican. Some districts packed with Democratic voters can have as many as eight or nine delegates up for grabs, while more Republican districts in the same state have three or four.

The system is designed to benefit candidates who do well among loyal Democratic constituencies, and none is more loyal than black voters. Obama, who would be the first black candidate nominated by a major political party, has been winning 80 percent to 90 percent of the black vote in most primaries, according to exit polls.

"Black districts always have a large number of delegates because they are the highest performers for the Democratic Party," said Elaine Kamarck, a Harvard University professor who is writing a book about the Democratic nominating process.

"Once you had a black candidate you knew that he would be winning large numbers of delegates because of this phenomenon," said Kamarck, who is also a superdelegate supporting Clinton.

In states like Ohio and Pennsylvania, Clinton won the statewide vote but Obama won enough delegates to limit her gains. In states Obama carried, like Georgia and Virginia, he maximized the number of delegates he won.

"The Obama campaign was very good at targeting districts in areas where they could do well," said former DNC Chairman Don Fowler, a Clinton superdelegate from South Carolina. "They were very conscious and aware of these nuances."

But, Fowler noted, the best strategy in the world would have been useless without the right candidate.

"If that same strategy and that same effort had been used with a different candidate, a less charismatic candidate, a less attractive candidate, it wouldn't have worked," Fowler said. "The reason they look so good is because Obama was so good."

In case you missed Robert Creamer's blog post at Huffingtonpost today, he writes about voters oh so similar to many here in North Dakota....and why they support Barack Obama:

Posted April 29, 2008 | 08:22 AM (EST)

There are five important factors that are critical to understanding the role these voters will have in this year's presidential election.

1). Contrary to popular belief, Clinton's advantage with this demographic has been far from universal. Remember that the entire primary season opened with Obama's surprise victory in Iowa -- not exactly Manhattan, unless of course you mean Manhattan, Kansas. (Obama also carried the Kansas caucus by 74% to 25%.)

And let's remember he also swept other states with major white rural populations. Examples include Nebraska (67% to 32%); Maine (59% to 40%); Alaska (75% to 24%); Wyoming (61% to 37%); Wisconsin (58% to 40%) and Minnesota (66% to 32%).

In Wisconsin, exit polls showed Obama carrying white men by 63% to 34% and rural voters 56% to 43%. In Virginia he carried white men 58% to 40% and rural voters 79% to 20%. In Georgia white men preferred Obama 48% to 46%, and rural voters preferred him 60% to 35%.

2). Clinton's own super-high negatives among independent voters -- including those in rural areas -- present her with a more difficult task than Obama in many rural states in the fall. Take Iowa, where the RealClearPolitics.com average of polls shows Obama up on McCain by 9.3% and McCain leading Clinton by 10%.

3). My mother used to say that you know that a romantic relationship has promise if the better you know the other person, the better you like them. The same is true in politics. When Barack Obama first ran for the US Senate from Illinois, many pundits laughed that an African American guy with a name like Obama had no chance at all in downstate Illinois. Wrong.

As people in downstate small cities and rural areas got to know Obama they warmed up fast. In the end Obama won almost 53% of the primary vote statewide against three other very strong candidates. When the original Republican candidate was forced to leave the race because of a sex scandal, Obama was so strong that the state GOP was forced to ship in Alan Keyes from Maryland to be their candidate. Obama crushed him in the general election.

I had dinner recently with the chair of the Scott County (IL) Democratic party. She described Barack's first meeting with her mainly rural, white male precinct committee people. It was safe to say that he didn't have them at "hello." They were pretty skeptical at first. But by the end of the meeting, most were sold on Obama's authenticity -- and on his understanding of people like themselves.

So it's not surprising that in the Illinois primary for president, Obama beat Hillary almost two-to-one in Illinois. Most of Illinois' 103 counties are rural or home to small cities and towns. Obama carried all but 14.

Does Obama play in Peoria? He carried Peoria County with 69.3%.

Obama won Adams County -- home of Quincy, on the Mississippi River -- by 60%.

He carried rural Henry County in northwest Illinois by 62%.

The fifteen counties in the far southern end of the state are physically -- and culturally -- closer to Jackson, Mississippi than to Chicago. People hunt, have guns, are predominantly white, and are committed to their churches. Obama carried far southern Illinois against Clinton.

Exit polls from the Illinois presidential primary show white men went for Obama 59% to 37%. Those men and women who earn less than $50,000/year voted 64% for Obama. People who live in small cities and rural areas supported Obama 53% to 43%.

Well, of course, you say: these people are from his home state. But that's the point. The more that rural voters and white men generally know about Obama, the more they support him.

4). Even where white rural men express their preference for Clinton in a Democratic primary, it doesn't mean they would vote for McCain in the general election if Obama is the nominee. Democratic primary voters almost always vote for the general election candidate of their party, and for good reason. They are Democrats because they understand that McCain's economic and foreign policies don't represent their best interests.

The real question is not primary voters -- it is how independent voters (people who don't vote in primaries) of all sorts would vote in the fall. Obama has shown that he is much more attractive to that all-important category of voter than Hillary Clinton.

5). There is one more fatal flaw in the narrative that Obama can't attract white rural men. You can say what you want to attack a political candidate, but if, in the end, it doesn't ring true, the argument generally won't prevail. Barack Obama is the furthest thing from the "elitist" that the Republicans and the Clinton campaign have tried to portray. In fact, at his core, he's the guy who went to work organizing unemployed steelworkers for a coalition of churches -- not a Washington insider like John McCain whose family is worth $100 million and owns nine homes.

The renewed media attention to the views of Obama's Pastor Rev. Wright may briefly distract attention from the real Obama. Of course the silver lining of Rev. Wright's three day PR tour is that it was conducted with such utter disregard for the interests of Obama's campaign that it serves to emphasize the great gulf between Obama and Wright - both in substance and in style.

And as voters come to know Obama, they realize that he has a huge quantity of the one quality that is just the opposite of elitism: empathy.

In her Pulitzer Prize-winning biography of Abraham Lincoln, A Team of Rivals, Doris Kearns Goodwin contends that Lincoln's ability to empathize -- "the gift or curse of putting himself in the place of another, to experience what they were feeling, to understand their motives and desires" -- was one of the major ingredients in his success as a politician and as a person.

In my own book, Stand Up Straight: How Progressives Can Win, I make the argument that empathy is the key that allows progressives to win -- and is the keystone of progressive values.

Barack Obama is blessed with an enormous abundance of empathy. That empathy is the quality that will enable him not only to reach out to white men, but to bring people of different backgrounds and cultural histories together to create a common American future.

Robert Creamer is a long time political organizer and strategist and author of the recent book, "Stand Up Straight. How Progressives Can Win," available on amazon.com

As one who greatly appreciated Doris Kearns Goodwin's "Team of Rivals" I've frequently reflected on President Lincoln and his association with various rivals, particulalry William Seward the Governor of New York when thinking about the Obama campaign.  Formidable rivals; Dodd, Biden, Richardson and Clinton all have tested Obama's strengths.  None more so than Clinton.  I hope that once elected President Obama can depend on his rivals for support and counsel, just as Lincoln did.  Comparisons of Senator Clinton with Governor Seward are easy to come by.  And the rivalry for the highest office between Lincoln and Seward seems to be recreated in this century with Obama and Clinton possessing so many comparable attributes to the earlier contest.  A post in the Huffingtonpost today make similar points.  Read:

Posted April 28, 2008 | 11:23 AM (EST)

More interestingly, the Democratic presidential nomination contest between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton bears some startling similarities to the 1860 Republican presidential race between Abraham Lincoln of Illinois and William Henry Seward of New York. In a series of strange historical coincidences, not only do the leading Democratic contenders for the presidency hail from the same states as their Republican predecessors but their political resumes are analogous too. Like Lincoln, who was a one term Congressman and who opposed the Mexican War of 1846-1848 as a land grab for slavery, Obama is a one term Senator and is known for his early opposition to the Iraq war. Like Lincoln, Obama is known for his soaring oratory and vision of change at a moment of crisis. Like Lincoln, voters view Obama as an unknown quantity but are inspired by him. Physically too, the tall and lanky Obama might well be an African American version of the man whose legacy he explicitly invoked when announcing his candidacy in Springfield, Illinois.

Clinton, on the other hand, looks a lot like Seward did in 1860. If anything, he was even more tested by national politics than she. Seward had been Governor of New York, the man behind the short-lived presidency of Zachary Taylor (1848-1850), and the Senator from New York in the 1850s. He was a leading voice of antislavery in Congress and reviled by southern Democrats on a regular basis. Compared to Lincoln, a small town lawyer, Seward, like Clinton, had been close to the White House, Congressional politics and was the more experienced and allegedly able candidate.

In 1860, however, the Republican nominating convention dumped Seward for the dark horse candidate, Abraham Lincoln. Seward commanded the loyalty of the party faithful but his lieutenants in the convention were completely out maneuvered by Lincoln's supporters from Illinois. The unexpected success of Barack Obama's presidential campaign strongly resembles the ultimate triumph of the Lincoln forces. Lincoln came from behind to defeat the front runner whose candidacy, like Clinton's, had an aura of inevitability about it until the very eve of the Republican convention.

A majority of Republicans in the convention viewed Seward, a veteran of many battles over slavery expansion in Congress, as too polarizing a figure. One of the biggest arguments against Hillary Clinton is precisely that she is too polarizing a figure. Over the years, Seward, like the Clintons, had made many political enemies, some within his own party. Some Republicans voted for Lincoln simply because they would rather not vote for Seward. Most Republicans went for Lincoln in 1860 because they wanted to broaden their party base and appeal to the less antislavery lower north. The solidly antislavery upper north was already in their column. That is same the argument that the Obama campaign is making now. No matter who is the Democratic presidential nominee, the reliably blue states will vote Democratic. But Obama might bring some red states and less partisan voters into the Democratic column. Here is the potential to create a new progressive majority that can shift the terms of political debate and transcend the politics of race. Just as Lincoln's election brought decades of slaveholder dominance of the federal government to an end, Obama can turn the tide on conservative dominance of political discourse in this country. Indeed, the Democratic party today is a counterpart to the mid-nineteenth century liberal Republican party, the party of Lincoln, and the Republican party today is a lot like its historical predecessor, the conservative Democratic party with its political base in the solid south.

During the Civil War, the tried and true Seward recommended negotiations with southern secessionists. It was the political novice, Lincoln, rather than Seward who comprehended the momentous nature of the war and moved toward emancipation, the arming of former slaves, and black citizenship. In the end, Seward and his pro-slavery southern Democratic detractors shared a common political world that Lincoln rejected. While John McCain and Hillary Clinton can vouch for each other's jingoistic patriotism, political experience and military toughness, Obama appeals in Lincoln's words, which Senator Edward Kennedy repeated in his endorsement of him, to the "better angels of our nature." Given the historical record, that might just be the quality that makes a great president.

Writing today in Politico, Elizabeth Drew, one of the great political writers of the last number of decades weighs in on the resiliency of the undecided superdelegates, and their likely support of Senator Obama.  It's worth reading:

Dems' suspense may be unnecessary
By: Elizabeth Drew
April 25, 2008 11:35 AM EST

The torrent of speculation about the end game of the Democratic nomination contest is creating a false sense of suspense – and wasting a lot of time of the multitudes who are anxious to know how this contest is going to turn out.

Notwithstanding the plentiful commentary to the effect that the Pennsylvania primary must have shaken superdelegates planning to support Barack Obama, causing them to rethink their position, key Democrats on Capitol Hill are unbudged.

“I don’t think anyone’s shaken,” a leading House Democrat told me. The critical mass of Democratic congressmen that has been prepared to endorse Obama when the timing seemed right remains prepared to do so. Their reasons, ones they have held for months, have not changed – and by their very nature are unlikely to.

Essentially, they are three:

(a) Hillary Rodham Clinton is such a polarizing figure that everyone who ever considered voting Republican in November, and even many who never did, will go to the polls to vote against her, thus jeopardizing Democrats down the ticket – i.e., themselves, or, for party leaders, the sizeable majorities they hope to gain in the House and the Senate in November.

(b) To take the nomination away from Obama when he is leading in the elected delegate count would deeply alienate the black base of the Democratic Party, and, in the words of one leading Democrat, “The superdelegates are not going to switch their votes and jeopardize the future of the Democratic Party for generations.” Such a move, he said, would also disillusion the new, mostly young, voters who have entered into politics for the first time because of Obama, and lose the votes of independents who could make the critical difference in November.

(c) Because the black vote can make the decisive difference in numerous congressional districts, discarding Obama could cost the Democrats numerous seats.

One Democratic leader told me, “If we overrule the elected delegates there would be mayhem.” Hillary Rodham Clinton’s claim that she has, or will have, won the popular vote does not impress them – both because of her dubious math and because, as another key Democrat says firmly, “The rules are that it’s the delegates, period.” (These views are closely aligned with Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s statement earlier this year that the superdelegates should not overrule the votes of the elected delegates.)

Furthermore, the congressional Democratic leaders don’t draw the same conclusion from Pennsylvania and also earlier contests that many observers think they do: that Obama’s candidacy is fatally flawed because he has as yet been largely unable to win the votes of working class whites. They point out something that has been largely overlooked in all the talk – the Ohio and Pennsylvania primaries were closed primaries, and, one key congressional Democrat says, “Yes, he doesn’t do really well with a big part of the Democratic base, but she doesn’t do well with independents, who will be critical to success in November.”

So, the fact that Mrs. Clinton has shown herself to be a remarkably resilient, tough campaigner, an attribute that the Clintons hope will carry much importance, this Democrat says, “is irrelevant.” This person added: “Many of the superdelegates are not going to be naïve enough to not realize the handwriting on the wall that this thing is going to Obama” – barring, he added, some major event like the Wright matter that he can’t seem to manage. They consider this unlikely. (There’s almost always a “something-might-happen” factor in elections.) As for the Wright matter, a key Democrat on Capitol Hill says, “Though it makes [his Democratic colleagues] a little nervous, it’s not enough to change their minds.” Moreover, the Wright matter may be old news come the general election.

At first, a large number of superdelegates planned to announce their support for Obama following Super Tuesday, but he didn’t do well enough to warrant that; then it was to be after Ohio and Texas; then after Pennsylvania; and some Democrats suggest that if Obama wins both Indiana and North Carolina a number of superdelegates will announce for him then. But the prevailing thinking is to allow the race to play out, avoiding a confrontation with Clinton and her backers, but also letting the pressure grow on her to justify continuing to fight a bloody but lost cause. This is, the thinking goes, the best and perhaps only way to get the thing wrapped up, as they so desperately want to do.

“We may have to go to June, and whoever ends up with the most delegates wins,” a key Democrat says. “Meanwhile, the attention will be on the battle she can’t win, so why is she doing this – from here on out she’s only bleeding the party. The right way to put it is, ‘This is a war of attrition and it’s obvious that the numbers aren’t going to add up, so what’s the point?’” He added, “The hope is that at some point the superdelegates will get frustrated and join the Obama bandwagon.”

This pressure may not be enough to get the tenacious Hillary Rodham Clinton to quit the race, but, says a leading Democrat, “Sometime in June we will make it clear to her that this thing isn’t going to the convention.”

Elizabeth Drew writes for The New York Review of Books. She is the author of numerous books, most recently "Richard M. Nixon" (Times Books, 2007)

© 2007 Capitol News Company, LLC

An interesting analysis inside the various polling numbers from dkos:

(Promoted from the diaries by kos. I don't buy the final prediction, but this is a good look at why the numbers vary from poll to poll. I was about to write up a similar post, but now I don't have to. )

In the last couple of days, a slew of PA polls have come out, with ranges from a 13 point Clinton lead to a 3 point Obama lead. Follow me below the jump for some interesting things that come out of the crosstabs.

For this diary, I'm focusing on the five polls for which some level of crosstabs are available (I have the Rasmussen subscription to see their crosstabs):

PPP Obama 49, Clinton 46
Mason-Dixon Clinton 48, Obama 43
Rasmussen Clinton 49, Obama 44
Quinnipiac Clinton 51, Obama 44
Suffolk Clinton 52, Obama 42

I was waiting to get the SurveyUSA crosstabs before publishing the diary, but I'm impatient- I did use some data from the WCAU news story on that poll.

I couldn't care less about anything Zogby or ARG say.

Here are some things that strike out at me:

The Suffolk regional demographics

Obviously, the Suffolk poll is the most favorable to Clinton out of this group. There is one big thing that stands out in this poll:

Pittsburgh/Southwest PA: 38% of all polled for Dem primary
Philadelphia/Southeast PA: 38% of all polled for Dem primary
Rest of state (the "T" area): 24% of all polled for Dem primary

Suffolk is the only polling firm approximating that SW PA (including the Allegheny area) is an equal voting bloc to Philly & SE PA. Other firms have the numbers at:

45% Philly/SE, 27% Pittsburgh/SW (Mason-Dixon)
45% Philly/SE, 26% Pittsburgh/SW (PPP)
46% Philly/SE, 23% Pittsburgh/SW (SurveyUSA April 15)

Obviously, with Philly/SE being Obama's strongest area, these regional demographics are a big deal. Suffolk has him up 57-40 in the SE region (higher than any other polling firm other than PPP- we'll get there next), but a huge disadvantage in Pittsburgh/SW (63-29 Clinton- also higher than any other pollster) means a large disadvantage in the state.

Let me put this on record, using both other polling data and historical/demographic data- there is no way Obama loses Pittsburgh+SW PA by 34 points (Quinnipiac has Pittsburgh proper at Clinton 50-44 and the rest of Southwest PA at Clinton 68-26; I think that means about a 20-25 point loss in Pitts+SW PA. Let me also add: there is no way that SW PA is equal to SE PA in total number of votes. Philly/SE has far more registered voters and every other pollster has that region as just under half of total voters. This makes sense to me.

In conclusion, Suffolk is way off- maybe not on the final number, but definitely on the way they got there.

The PPP "Outlier"

PPP, while a reputable pollster this primary cycle, seems way off on their poll this time showing Obama up 3. I've heard talk that the poll is an outlier; not exactly correct since an outlier is that 1/20 polls that is just way off, and PPP has been consistently showing Obama stronger than others. Regardless, there is not another pollster within 8 points of this projection.

Strangely though, their data on most of the state is roughly similar to that of other pollsters. The big difference: Philly/SE PA.

In Philly/SE PA, the pollsters show:

Suffolk: Obama 57, Clinton 40
Mason-Dixon: Obama 49, Clinton 44
SurveyUSA: Obama up 14 (not sure on the specs until we get crosstabs)
Quinnipiac: Obama 54-41 in Philly, 50-46 in the rest of SE PA- lets call that Obama 52-43
PPP: Obama 58, Clinton 32

There's your difference. And it sets up a baseline for what would have to happen for Obama to win PA- he would need a 20+ point gap in Southeast PA and Philly, or a 15-20 point gap with a massive turnout to make that area over 50 % of the total vote. Probably not going to happen.

One interesting thing about the PPP poll- it does show undecideds breaking 60-40 Clinton, which is about what I and others expected.

Rasmussen & the A-A vote

One oddity about the Rasmussen poll- it shows Clinton with 21% of the African-American vote. If that happens, I'll never post an analysis again- just not going to happen. Every other pollster has it at 81-84 percent Obama, 10-12 percent Clinton, with about 7 percent undecided. I think it'll end up like 86-14 Obama.

There are some other oddities here and there. Clinton's lead among women varies from 8 points (Rasmussen) to 23 points (SUSA). Obama leads or is tied among men in every poll but Suffolk (I think the regional analysis shows why he's down with men in Suffolk), though it ranges from a tie (Rasmussen) to 21 points up (PPP). White voters are fairly static in the polls (ranging from a 14-21 point Clinton lead). The non-Pittsburgh/Philly parts of the state seem fairly close as well- about a 15 point Clinton lead.

My gutcheck prediction

If Philly/SE comes in at about a 12 point Obama lead (far below PPP, in between M&D, SUSA and Suffolk, and the rest of the state (including Pittsburgh) comes in at about a 15 point Clinton lead (pretty close to what everyone other than Suffolk says), all of which I believe:

Clinton 51, Obama 49

That's my pick, and I'm sticking to it until misled by exit polls tomorrow.

Update by kos: Sorry to intrude into this post, but SUSA has released its crosstabs, and their regional breakdown is:

43% Philly/SE -- 41C, 55O
24% Pittsburgh/SW  -- 58C, 36O
4% Northwest -- 61C, 36O
7% West Center -- 59C, 21O
10% South Center -- 49C, 43O
11% Northeast -- 60C, 37O

An interesting piece today from "The American Prospect".  Go read:

That creaking noise you hear is the sound of me going way out on limb to predict that Barack Obama will win the Pennsylvania primary on Tuesday, finally ending Hillary Clinton's presidential ambitions.

After all sound and fury, the race in Pennsylvania will come down to the strength of get- out-the-vote (GOTV) operations, and I think Obama's campaign's organizational advantages will be enough to push him past Clinton by almost two percentage points. He's got money, he's got energy and enthusiasm (despite his debate performance on Tuesday), and he's got Philadelphia and its suburbs

Broadly speaking, presidential elections are almost always decided by what and who Americans think best suits the moment. After all the wins and losses, after all the gaffes, the deceptions, and the rare moments of inspiration, Obama, is simply closer to the mood of the country than either Clinton or McCain.

Obama is selling change. Both of his opponents are selling the virtues of experience, but voters, fed up with the way things have been going, view experience as more of a problem than a solution.

Still, it's an election and Obama can blow it (he erred in, among other things, not anticipating the controversy over Rev. Wright ), but he has shown himself capable under attack and in Pennsylvania he has some underreported advantages.

At first glance, Pennsylvania, one of the whitest, oldest, and most working class states in the country, should be Clinton's to lose. The demographic numbers are indisputable, but the beating heart of Democratic politics in the Keystone state is Philadelphia -- and now, its suburbs -- and the whole region is indisputably in the Obama column.

Since Election Day 2007, 306,686 people have registered as Democrats in Pennsylvania -- more than 45 percent of them (139,000) in Philadelphia and the Philly 'burbs. And two college counties, Centre, 19.6 percent (Penn State), and Union, 17.3 percent (Bucknell University) are in the top three counties in terms of the percentage increase of new Democratic voters. Again, it's fair to most new registrants are Obama voters. He will not win Northeast Philadelphia or some precincts in South and Southwest Philly, but he will still win by a large margin in the Philadelphia region.

The path to an Obama win is relatively straight forward: run up the numbers in and around Philadelphia, fight for and maybe even win the Lehigh Valley cities Bethlehem and Allentown, and minimize his losses in the west. This is a strategy that tracks with Democratic victories in Pennsylvania in recent years.

Here, finally, is why I think he wins:

 

• Clinton hasn't succeeded in making any of her criticisms of Obama stick. He has managed to weather scandals that would sink politician of lesser skill.

   

• Clinton has been most effective when she is seen as the victim and underdog, but, given her aggressive response to Obama's "bitter" comments and her established strength in Pennsylvania neither of these circumstances apply. If can resist the urge to complain about his treatment in the debate he may be the one seen as a victim.

   

• Bob Casey, Jr.

The importance of the Casey's endorsement of Obama is hard to overstate. In part that's because Pennsylvania's junior senator is as daring as a piece of Lackawanna anthracite coal and is seen as unwilling or unable to play cynical political games. What's more, he is an able counterbalance to Clinton's two biggest supporters -- the affably pugnacious Gov. Ed. Rendell, and Philadelphia's African American Mayor Michael Nutter.

Casey is also exactly kind of conservative, Catholic, blue-collar Democrat that Obama is supposed to have the most trouble attracting. He needs Casey's help all the more now that some of these voters think that he sees them as clinging to guns and religion out of a sense of economic frustration. In a new ad for Obama, Casey makes the election clearly about the economy, declaring on camera that "in towns like yours and mine, families are struggling with bills they can't afford and jobs moving away. It has to change -- but it won't until we change Washington."

But Casey's endorsement does something less obvious for Obama -- it rescues him from being the 'Philadelphia candidate' and all the taint of racialized politics, corruption, and urban decay that such a label would put on him. This is especially true when Casey's support is contrasted with Rendell's and Nutter's, since both are current or former mayors of Philadelphia.

So my call is Obama by a point and a half. Creak ...

In Obama, an exciting opportunity

Posted: April 11, 2008This presidential election season has generated considerable excitement around the nation. And there is a reason for it. It may well be the most important election of our lifetime. America faces grave challenges - a war, climate change, the economy, the lack of access to health care, to name a few - that cry out for solution. And, we also have a unique opportunity to change the direction of the country in a fundamental and transformative way.

Those of us in Indian country have a stake in the outcome of this presidential election at this critical time in the nation's politics. We have been following the campaign of Illinois Sen. Barack Obama for the past year with special interest and have been impressed that Native Americans have always figured prominently in his campaign of inclusion.

In his major speech on race, Sen. Obama included Native Americans once again in his call for unity to address the challenges of the new century. He said, ''This time we want to talk about the crumbling schools that are stealing the future of black children and white children and Asian children and Hispanic children and Native American children. This time we want to reject the cynicism that tells us that these kids can't learn; that those kids who don't look like us are somebody else's problem. The children of America are not those kids, they are our kids, and we will not let them fall behind in a 21st century economy. Not this time.''

Indian country certainly has a right to be skeptical about national politicians. We know from personal experience that all too often promises made on the campaign trail fade in the act of governance.

But we have come to believe that Sen. Obama offers a different kind of leadership and presents an opportunity for Native peoples that we have not seen before. He has shown that he appreciates the unique history and challenges of our communities. And he understands that we can only realize our common dreams if we are equal partners in the national dialogue.

Sen. Obama began his career as a community organizer on the streets of Chicago. He has said that this experience showed him that change comes from empowering communities and reinforced his respect for tribal sovereignty. He dismisses what he calls one-size-fits-all solutions from Washington and says that empowering tribal communities to address their own problems will be an important goal of his presidency. That message resonates with Native peoples because Indian country is confident that we have the answer to our challenges but need an administration that will be a partner with us.

Sen. Obama throughout this campaign has demonstrated his desire to listen to and work with Native communities by meeting with Native American tribal leaders all across the country and by assembling an impressive group of Native American advisers. His commitment to addressing our priorities is evident in the agenda he laid out for Indian country, ''Principles for Stronger Tribal Communities,'' which emphasizes his support for tribal sovereignty and his commitment to improve the government-to-government relationship between the tribes and the federal government. His plan also calls for greater federal resources to help tribes address shortfalls in health care, education, law enforcement and energy assistance, and to support regulated Indian gaming as a tribal resource.

But what is most far-reaching, innovative and exciting about Sen. Obama's well-crafted agenda is that he has pledged to take unprecedented steps as president to bring Native Americans into the conversation and into partnership in defining and prioritizing a policy agenda for tribal communities. He will communicate directly with Native American leaders and include them in important policy decisions that impact Indian country. His plan includes a promise to appoint an American Indian policy adviser on his senior White House staff so that Indian country has a clear voice at the highest levels of the Obama administration. He also pledges to call an annual meeting with Native American leaders to develop and implement a national Indian policy agenda. These are the type of ideas and this is the kind of leadership that will bring the fundamental change we so desperately need.

Sen. Obama understands our unique challenges and will work to solve them. But he also believes that ''we cannot solve the challenges of our time unless we solve them together - unless we perfect our union by understanding that we may have different stories, but we hold common hopes; that we may not look the same and we may not have come from the same place, but we all want to move in the same direction - towards a better future for our children and our grandchildren.''

At the dawn of the 21st century, when the United States overall has greater income disparity than we've seen since the first year of the Great Depression, when some CEOs are making more in a day than the average worker makes in a year, when wages are flat, jobs are moving overseas and the cost of health care, energy and college are rising, and when one in eight Americans now lives in abject poverty, Obama is issuing a call for unity so that we can make real change for all Americans that will restore balance in our economy and put us all on a path to prosperity. As he said in last week's speech, to do that ''requires all Americans to realize that your dreams do not have to come at the expense of my dreams,'' and that ''the children of America are not these kids, they are our kids, and we will not let them fall behind in a 21st century economy.''

Nowhere do these words reverberate and find a home more than in Indian country. A 2003 U.S. Commission on Civil Rights report found that American Indians suffer from a ''quiet crisis'' of poverty, unemployment and discrimination. As Native Americans, we know what that means in the daily lives of our people.

In endorsing Sen. Obama for president, The Native American Times wrote: ''Perhaps more than anything, Obama inspires us to want and dream of more. Indian country has been waiting for someone like Barack for a long time. Now is the time for positive change and now is the time to vote Barack Obama.'' Day by day, as the 2008 campaign unfolds it becomes more and more clear that Sen. Obama is the right choice for Native Americans and all Americans.

John Yellowbird Steele, president, Oglala Sioux Tribe; William ''Shorty'' Brewer, vice president, Oglala Sioux Tribe; Michael Jandreau, chairman, Lower Brule Sioux Tribe; Rodney Bordeaux, president, Rosebud Sioux Tribe; Robert Moore, councilman, Rosebud Sioux Tribe; and Joseph Brings Plenty, chairman, Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe, are members of Sen. Barack Obama's Tribal Leaders Steering Committee. 

And so here it is:

11 Apr 2008 12:55 pm

They are now using his staggeringly honest autobiography against him, using out-of-context quotes to make him seem like a racist. Yes, the repellent Coulter - still treated as a legitimate voice on the far right - has called Obama's book a dime-store "Mein Kampf." Sometimes I wonder if some white Republicans actually believe that black people in this country have no reason to feel any anger or alienation at times. I'm not talking about letting it consume you - just feeling it, dealing with it, managing it.

I guess I might feel the same way as these sheltered folk if I weren't gay. But anger is a totally legitimate thing to feel when you grow up and realize you will never be allowed to celebrate a marriage or build a family like your parents or siblings. It is totally legitimate when your emotional core is constantly ridiculed, demeaned and even treated as a sickness or a sin. It became a necessity when hundreds of thousands died while others looked on, or persecuted the sick with segregation or disdain, or blamed them for their disease. It is totally understandable when even now, after living in this country for 24 years, with a family and a home, I have to seek a waiver from the government every year to allow me to stay in this country because I have HIV, and only people married to a member of the opposite sex are treated like human beings if immigrants. The government denies you family, dignity and even a secure home - and you are never supposed to feel anger?

My "conservative" position in gay politics has never been that anger is wrong. It is that it cannot provide the full answer. It's a trap that can destroy you if you allow it to. We have to get beyond anger to explain, engage, persuade, reason, integrate ... in order to make anger less relevant to the next generation. With gays, each generation springs afresh from new heterosexual homes and families, and so healing can be relatively fast, even if it is never easy. But with African-Americans, these disadvantages and resentments and feelings are more easily passed from generation to generation, and skin color can act as a constant, unpassable feature of your life that can drive you crazy if you do not master it. Economics entrenches this. You have to be blind not to see the pathos of so many trapped in this. Conservatives should be able to see this pain, and help alleviate it in ways that make sense (not socialism or big government dependency), not dismiss it as a form of hatred.

The great spiritual gift of Obama is that he has mastered this - not by suppressing it or denying it. But by confronting it, looking at it, expressing it, and channeling it to better ends. That some on the far right would now use this process of honesty as a way to describe Obama as a racist is a sign of their cramped hearts, frightened souls and utter inability to empathize. One day, they will feel ashamed. Right now, they simply have to be overcome.

(Photo: Tim Sloan/AFP/Getty.)

Gary Hart has been thinking, writing, speaking and acting upon his beliefs related to the Democratic Party being the progressive party of reform in America for decades.  Today, again, he addresses the false right vs. left dichotomy, and describes why Barack Obama is the true leader of the party for the future.  Read:

Posted March 25, 2008 | 10:39 AM (EST)
One of the more enduring myths in Washington is that Americans live their lives on a left-right ideological spectrum. We are all little liberals or little conservatives. Thus, the New York Times ponders how the "liberal" Barack Obama can fashion a governing coalition when conventional wisdom continues to convince us that the political center of gravity in America is right of center and only Clintonian "centrism" offers the Democrats a shot at governing. And, if you spend your adult life in Washington (which some of us choose not to do), you fall into the static mindset.

But what if most Americans, unlike perpetual Washington insiders, are neither liberal nor conservative? What if, instead, we live our lives on a future-past continuum? Students of Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., and others know that those who deal only in ideology can still make this work: the Democratic party (at its best) is the progressive party, the party of the future, and the Republican party is the party that wishes to hold onto the past. When the Democratic party is truly the party of the future, for change, for experimentation, for adaptation, we win. When we "triangulate," we may create enough confusion to get ourselves elected, but we have no mandate to govern and we sacrifice our identity.

The best Democratic leaders, those who succeed as national leaders, are those who define the future and show us how to get there. It shouldn't surprise anyone that those rare leaders, like Barack Obama, also have a "liberal" voting record, especially when, as Senator Obama accurately points out, right-wing ideologues make sure the voting deck is stacked to reflect the old divisive agenda they've perfected. But, as he also points out, "as president, I would be setting the agenda."

Contrary to the New York Times story, this election is not a left-right election. This is a future-past election and that is why I, a veteran of such politics, strongly believe the candidate of the future, who understands the dramatic changes now at work in the world and who is bold enough to propose innovative ways of dealing with them in the nation's interest, is Barack Obama. Besides, when he is elected, perhaps we will have journalism that understands the difference.

Obama to be Dem-NPL Keynote Speaker

Grand Forks – Senator Barack Obama will bring his message of hope and optimism to North Dakota as the keynote speaker during the Democratic-NPL nominating convention this April in Grand Forks. Senator Obama will help open the convention with a speech on Friday, April 4.

“North Dakota Democrats showed their strong support for Senator Obama on February 5th, and I’m thrilled to have the potential Democratic presidential nominee as the keynote speaker at our convention,” Congressman Pomeroy said. “Senator Obama has a powerful message of hope and change that resonates across party lines and across the country. I look forward to hearing him deliver that message to North Dakota Democrats at our convention in April.”

Barack's speech today, March 18th 2008, may someday have a title different from "A More Perfect Union" but that's what it is being called today.  And it was remarkable.  Here are a few of the pundits weighing in now on one of the great speeches of our time:

Sen. Barack Obama's speech on race this morning showed off exactly why he's become the frontrunner for the Democratic presidential nomination. He's absolutely willing to challenge the conventional way of how politicians approach controversy. In my opinion, it was the best speech so far in this campaign.

The video of the speech is now available.

Andrew Sullivan: "I have never felt more convinced that this man's candidacy - not this man, his candidacy - and what he can bring us to achieve - is an historic opportunity. This was a testing; and he did not merely pass it by uttering safe bromides. He addressed the intimate, painful love he has for an imperfect and sometimes embittered man. And how that love enables him to see that man's faults and pain as well as his promise. This is what my faith is about. It is what the Gospels are about. This is a candidate who does not merely speak as a Christian. He acts like a Christian."

Charles Murray: "Has any other major American politician ever made a speech on race that comes even close to this one? As far as I'm concerned, it is just plain flat out brilliant -- rhetorically, but also in capturing a lot of nuance about race in America. It is so far above the standard we're used to from our pols."

Ben Smith: "A smart colleague notes that this speech is the polar opposite of this year's other big speech on faith, in which Mitt Romney went to Texas to talk about Mormonism, but made just one reference to his Mormon faith. Obama mentions Wright by name 14 times."

First Read: "His tone throughout was quiet and thoughtful. The same speech could have been delivered in a fiery tone. But Obama chose one that was quiet and thoughtful. It did little to lessen the impact and may have added to the weight of his words."

Marc Ambinder: "How it plays will determine how it plays. If the media focuses more on the Wright defense-by-renouncements and then juxtaposes them with clips of Wright's comments, then I think the trouble remains. The seeds of doubt about who this guy really is may be nourished. I know that Obama believes that a discussion about race plays to his benefit, no matter what people think about white working class voters and their latent feelings. Perhaps this is the beginning of his opportunity to lift the veil and get everyone -- not just himself and the media -- to talk openly."

Today's Forum editorial is intrigued by the SurveyUSA Poll suggesting Barack might win North Dakota:

Poll finds Obama would beat McCain in North Dakota.

Our position:

One poll is not a trend, but the results are fascinating.

Here’s one for the history books: A new poll from SurveyUSA found that if the presidential election were held now, Barack Obama would best John McCain in North Dakota. The sampling of 574 likely voters in the state said 46 percent would go for Obama, 42 percent for McCain. In the same poll, Sen. Hillary Clinton would lose to McCain, 54 percent to 35 percent among North Dakotans.

Of course, a single poll is nothing more than a snapshot in time. It’s not a definitive measure of voter preference unless it’s supplemented by a series of polls and other analyses that identify trends and settled voter sentiment. Nonetheless, even the suggestion that a Democrat – any Democrat – can win the presidential vote in historically red-state North Dakota in 2008 is an eyebrow-raiser.

North Dakota has rarely been blue on the election map. Since statehood, North Dakotans have favored the Democratic presidential candidate only five times: Woodrow Wilson in 1912 and 1916, Franklin Roosevelt in 1932 and 1936; Lyndon Johnson in 1964. Some historians argue that those departures from the state’s reliable Republican tilt were due to unique circumstances: Wilson’s pledge (violated) to keep the United States out of World War I; Roosevelt’s New Deal promises to raise the nation out of the Great Depression; Johnson, carrying on the agenda of assassinated John Kennedy and lucky enough to run against deeply unpopular Barry Goldwater.

The North Dakota SurveyUSA poll (done in late February) is broken down by age and gender. Obama easily won the 18-34 group (57 percent to 33 percent for McCain, 9 percent undecided), lost by a little the 35-54 group (41 percent to

47 percent, 12 percent undecided) and won elderly voters (44 percent to McCain’s 42 percent, 14 percent undecided).

By gender, Obama was within the poll’s margin of sampling error with

45 percent of male voters to 44 percent for McCain. Female voters broke

48 percent for Obama, 39 percent

for McCain.

When broken down by political ideology, 58 percent of North Dakota voters identifying themselves as “moderate” went to Obama. That’s the group any candidate has to win in order to win the presidency. Ten percent of self-identified conservatives said they would vote for Obama over McCain, possibly an indication that a self-destructive strain of conservative anger with McCain has not softened.

Again, one poll is not a predictor of Election Day results. Indeed, North Dakota’s presidential preference history would seem to suggest an Obama win (should he be the nominee) is – to understate it – a long shot. Still, the poll’s finding that Obama has significant support in a traditionally Republican (for presidents) state, ought not to be dismissed.

Forum editorials represent the opinion of Forum management and the newspaper’s Editorial Board.

SurveyUSA has done a first round of electoral math, which indicates Obama would defeat McCain in the General Election.  But of specific interest is the fact that their polling (600 Likely Voters) shows Barack WINNING THE STATE OF NORTH DAKOTA!  Now that's transformational.  Go look:

http://www.surveyusa.com/index.php/2008/03/06/electoral-math-as-of-030608-obama-280-mccain-258/

04 Mar 2008 12:57 pm

David Brooks describes the stakes in this election as between old and new politics. I take his point, but I do want to insist that this new politics of which we Obama-fans are talking is not some kind of millennialist, utopian fantasy. I don't think Obama has - or anyone ever will - abolish the human nature of political life: its combat, its competing interests, its partisanship, its necessary compromises. If I thought one man could do that, I should be given a Valium and told to take some time off.

No: the reason to back Obama is because this country is in a terrible hole. The economy is headed into the shitter, the dollar is plunging, soaring government debt and individual fiscal recklessness (now rewarded by the Fed's rate-cutting) have created the chance of a serious recession, the US is mired in a permanent occupation of a deeply divided failed state in the Muslim Arab world, and key American values - that we do not torture, that we rescue our allies - have been abandoned by a callow, incompetent president.

In the midst of this, we have a domestic politics that has become poisonously polarized by the cumulative impact of two decades of Dick Morris, Karl Rove-style politics and have lurched from one president whose every sentence was a carefully parsed legalism to one often in total denial about the reality he grapples with. We desperately need not some kind of new politics, but a return to reasoned politics, to leaders who, even when they disagree, can rationally explain how and why. Americans know we have deeply serious problems and are tired of deeply unserious posturing. Republicans have grasped this. That's why they actually rejected the most polarizing (Giuliani) and cynical (Romney) and facile (Huckabee) candidates, in favor of a serious man, who is at least open to opposing arguments and engaged in more than partisan hucksterism and nasty minority-baiting.

The Democrats, so far, have as well. Obama is simply more capable, more trustworthy, more reasonable and less partisan than Clinton. That's all. He is not a messiah, for Pete's sake, and I'm tired of being told that those of us who support him are somehow irrational or emotional. Above all, he will not breathe new life into the very pathologies with which we have all been consumed for too long. She will. Some of this is her fault; some of it isn't. I see my own attempt to move forward constructively impeded by the emotions she and her husband have the power to evoke. But her partisanship and divisiveness are not in my mind alone. She knows what she's doing - and, in my view, we cannot afford her any more.

If that is a new politics, fine. But only if "new" means an older, calmer discourse for newer, more perilous times. That's what Obama represents. And we have to keep focused on that, unless the easy and familar habits of easy, tired politics prevents us from seizing a moment that history doesn't offer very often.

The Forum has an interesting blurb on the North Dakota Democratic-NPL Party confirmation that they have invited Barack to speak at the State Convention in Grand Forks, April 4-6.  Be sure to plan on attending in case the next President is able to appear.  If you are not already a delegate to the convention find out who your District chair is and inquire if there are any empty delegate slots available.  Most districts leave it to the discretion of the chair to fill out the delegation slots.  You can find out more by contacting the state party at www.demnpl.com or call them, 701-255-0460.

Here's the Forum article:

“Efforts have been made to get him to be our keynote speaker,” said party communications director Rick Gion, but there’s no answer yet.

Party Executive Director Jamie Selzler said the party has also asked Sen. Hillary Clinton to consider speaking at the convention.

He said the party should know early next week if one might be their speaker.

The Democratic-NPL state convention is April 4-6 at the Alerus Center in Grand Forks.

Gary Hart has another prescient column on the potential of the Obama presidency.  Go read:

Posted February 13, 2008 | 02:35 PM (EST)

Only once in a very long time does politics become more than politics, that is something more than partisan struggle, vote bartering, or arena of ambition. In ordinary times, ordinary political leaders suffice, more or less.

But on rare occasion, old arrangements and conventional wisdom come unstuck. This happens in periods of rapid if not revolutionary change. We find ourselves now in one of those periods. The forces of globalization, information, eroding sovereignties, and transformation of war ensure that traditional leaders and conventional politics can only muddle through at best and fail badly at worst.

But periods of upheaval also offer opportunities, opportunities to change our methods, our ideas, and our leaders. The rare leader capable of transforming threat to opportunity is one who welcomes transformation and sees it as a chance to abandon tradition and convention, to transcend that which is stale, unprofitable, and ineffective.

Periods of transformation require experimentation, innovation, and daring. America is a nation much more conservative than it thinks itself to be. Thus, its default position is to resist a forward leap even while applauding itself for its creativity. Al Capone said it best: "We don't want no trouble." But transformation is trouble in the best sense of the word, trouble that causes us to adapt to new conditions and circumstances and create new ways of governing.

Through some miracle of timing, luck, and good fortune Barack Obama has seized the moment. His mantra of "change" has been largely co-opted by lesser figures. He is in fact an agent of transformation. He is not operating on the same plane as ordinary politicians, and this makes him seem elusive to the conventional press and the traditional politicians. His instinct for the moment and the times is orders of magnitude more powerful than the experience claimed by others. Experience in the old ways is irrelevant experience.

In an age of great transformation, experience of the past is worthless because it is a barrier to the breakthrough gesture, the instant response in crisis, the instinctive bold decision in the face of totally new circumstances.

Some see Barack Obama as the long awaited champion finally come to slay the awful dragon of race. And they are right. Some see him as a new start for the Democratic Party and national politics. And they are right. Some see him as the walking embodiment of internationalism, ready to restore an honorable and respected place for America in the world. And they are right.

I see Barack Obama as a leader for this transcendent moment, the agent of transformation in an age of revolution, as a figure uniquely qualified to open the door to the 21st century and to convert threat to great new opportunity.

I'm beginning to sense that the vaunted Superdelegates may not prove to be a problem for the Obama campaign, but more likely a benefit in securing the nomination.

If these so called party elders were truly handcuffed to the Clinton era they likely would have endorsed early, and vociferously.  Indeed, some have but most have not.  If the possibility of Barack winning the day with the "Supers" was outside the realm, then why haven't they already aligned with Hillary?  I sense they are doing their due diligence and will be more than happy to declare for Obama as momentum dictates.  Especially House and Senate members.  If they've not gone to HRC yet, than they are ripe for the pickings.

We might begin to see these declarations later this week, once the results of Virginia, Maryland and DC come into focus.  With a string of eight consecutive victories the strength of the Obama campaign will provide a fair number of Congressional members with the substance they need to declare themselves.

Added impetus could of course come from endorsements by Gore, Edwards, Pelosi and Reid.  They may not all make declarations, but I wouldn't be surprised if some would.

I have little fear of an avalanche of Superdelegates surging towards Clinton.  Quite the contrary, such an avalanche should bolster Mount Barack.

Obama's ND victory recipe: Volunteers, organization and money

By DALE WETZEL
Associated Press Writer

BISMARCK, N.D. (AP) -- Democrat Barack Obama's North Dakota presidential campaign was easily the most prominent of any candidate, with frequent mailings, legions of volunteers, work from 10 paid staffers and television ads featuring Sen. Kent Conrad's endorsement.

It paid off Tuesday in a decisive victory over Hillary Clinton, in which Obama won 65 of 82 reporting locations, held a big edge in North Dakota's four largest cities, and rolled up 3-to-1 margins at the University of North Dakota and North Dakota State University.

"Barack had a fantastic organization here in North Dakota, as I think he has had throughout the country," said Dan Hannaher, an Obama adviser and a former North Dakota state Democratic chairman.

With all 47 of North Dakota's precincts reporting late Tuesday, Obama had 11,625 votes, or 61 percent, to Clinton's 6,948, or 37 percent. The remaining votes went to John Edwards, Dennis Kucinich, Mike Gravel and a handful of write-ins.

In the tiny community of Amidon in the state's southwestern corner, all seven voters favored Obama. The NDSU caucus location went for Obama, 1,139 to 310. At UND, the result was similar, 1,153 to 349.

"He's got so many young people behind him. They're looking for change," said state Sen. David O'Connell, D-Lansford, the Democratic Senate floor leader. O'Connell initially supported Edwards, but switched to Obama after the former North Carolina senator dropped out of the race.

"I know change is a buzz word, but Obama just excites people," O'Connell said. "He excites me."

Jamie Selzler, director of the state Democratic Party, said 19,012 North Dakotans took part in the caucus.

"I think it shows that Democrats and independents in this state are eager for change," Selzler said. "Today was their first day where they could actually go out and put that change into action."

Democrats had been hoping for a turnout of between 12,000 and 15,000 people. During North Dakota's Democratic presidential caucuses four years ago, 10,508 people voted.

Democratic voting locations opened across the state at 2 p.m., and closed at 8 p.m. Central time. Selzler said some locations had to print more ballots because of the crush of voters.

Caucus participants filled out forms supplying their names, addresses and other information. North Dakota has no voter registration, and the caucuses are helping both Democrats and Republicans identify sympathetic voters.

"We now have a list of 19,000 people who are eager enough about change that they showed up and voted on a cold day in February," Selzler said.

Obama and Clinton got most of the votes from North Dakota Democrats, although five people were on the ballot used by caucus-goers. Edwards, Kucinich and Gravel were also listed, along with a line for write-ins.

Edwards, who got 283 votes in final returns, and Kucinich, who got 72 votes, recently dropped out of the race. Gravel, a former Alaska senator who has gotten scant backing for his campaign, got 31 votes. Fifty-three people wrote in their own favorites.

A minimum of 15 percent voter support was required for a candidate to qualify for a North Dakota delegate. The caucus results will be used to allocate 13 of North Dakota's 21 delegates to the Democratic National Convention, which is being held Aug. 25-28 in Denver.

North Dakota and Minnesota were among 24 states that held some type of voting contest for president on Tuesday.

During his campaign, Obama opened campaign offices in Fargo, Grand Forks, Minot and Bismarck and moved 10 staffers into the state. Clinton relied on volunteers.

Conrad and Rep. Earl Pomeroy, D-N.D., endorsed Obama, and Pomeroy led a last-minute tour to tout Obama's prospects. More than 20 Democratic state legislators who had backed Edwards, including O'Connell, switched to Obama when Edwards dropped out.

Former North Dakota Gov. George Sinner and his wife, Jane, were Clinton's most high-profile North Dakota representatives.

The Obama campaign "committed the resources necessary to deliver his message," Hannaher said. "I've never been more impressed by a presidential campaign ... than I have been with the commitment that this campaign brought to North Dakota."

© 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Learn more about our Privacy Policy.