Can Hillary Win?

No.

Nope.

Nahhhh.

Negatory.

Na guh do it.

Sen. Clinton just had her best night of the primary season. She got a 10 point win in a state where both candidates went all-out. But it was a state that was heavily stacked in her favor, demographics-wise. She was 20 points up a month ago.

Sen. Obama cut that in half, during a month when:

1. The Rev. Wright scandal became a huge media event.
2. Just as Obama seemed to recover from that, he made his unfortunate "bitter/cling" comments.
3. The Clinton campaign continued its "kitchen sink" strategy of pounding every negative story line it could find.
4. The debate on ABC seemed totally fixated on magnifying the Wright/Bitter/Elitist angles.

It was overall, a pretty bad month for Obama. Yet he kept moving forward. He defused the Wright controversy effectively enough, although it will certainly continue to be an issue. He handled the "bitter/cling" stuff calmly and minimized the damage there--although again, it hurt him. But I continue to be impressed with his ability to take a punch (to use the Rocky imagery that Clinton appropriated).

Obama should be able to move on to a convincing win in North Carolina, and might win in Indiana. The other contests will be a wash. If he wins in both those state, I believe it will be over. If he only wins big in NC and the rest are close, we might see this thing contested to the convention. I really doubt it will go that far, though.

At some point, the Democratic Party leadership is going to say, "enough is enough." Obama is going to end up with the majority of the popular vote, the majority of the delegates, and will be very close with the superdelegates. He will be the clear choice of African Americans (the Dems' most loyal voting bloc), young voters (the party's future), and will continue to show he can out-fundraise anyone on the planet.

In short, he cannot be denied. Clinton should enjoy this victory. It's all downhill from here.