Right Back Where We Started From

Judging a political contest is like handicapping a horse race – you study a horse, know his strengths and weaknesses, how fast he is, what kind of track he runs better on, and stack him up against the rest of the field. Then you do it again for each horse in the field.

The real question today is whether Hillary Clinton can raise enough cash to keep her in the race – as to the concept that perception is reality, if she can win big enough in Indiana (whether by one point or ten, its hard to say what the magic number is today) she can continue to beat the fund raising drum.

Even as I write that last sentence, though, I know as well as anybody that her big donors are tapped. Her internet cash haul is growing, but as Obama’s people will tell you, it takes a lot of effort to garner all those small donations week after week.

If she can pull Indiana out and win North Carolina (about as likely as my hair growing back) then the O-Man is on the ropes, even though he would still be closer to the goal – the tea leaf readers will sense shifting momentum and trumpet it across the airwaves.

I don’t see Obama winning Indiana, and I don’t see Clinton winning North Carolina – if Obama’s urban congressional district routs hold up (that’s where the highest delegate counts are), though, he could net 10 more delegates than Clinton tomorrow…

…which would put us right back where we were two months ago.