http://www.newsday.com/news/local/politics/ny-uscamp0513,0,1760614,print.story
Clinton compares her campaign to JFK in 1960
BY GLENN THRUSH
7:34 PM EDT, May 12, 2008
CLEAR FORK, W.Va.
Hillary Rodham Clinton Monday compared her underdog quest for the White
House to John F. Kennedy's 1960 campaign -- while her top strategist
likened
Barack Obama's sky-high confidence to George W. Bush's infamous "Mission
Accomplished" declaration.
A Suffolk University poll Monday showed the former first lady leading
Barack
Obama by 36 points ahead of Tuesday's West Virginia primary -- which would
be her biggest victory margin of the campaign. But analysts say a win
tonight is likely to do little to erode Obama's lead in delegates, or stem
the steady trickle of undecided superdelegates to the Illinois senator --
26
in the last week alone.
Clinton swatted aside suggestions she would drop out before the final
ballots are cast in early June, reveling in chants of "Don't quit!" from
enthusiastic and virtually all-white crowds in West Virginia coal country.
"Democrats don't get elected president unless West Virginia votes for
you,"
said Clinton, 60, whose motorcade crept through fog-shrouded mountain
switchbacks in a soaking rain to reach this mining town.
"It was West Virginia that made it possible for John Kennedy to become
president," Clinton told 400 sup****ters at a local high school. "John
Kennedy didn't have the number of delegates he needed when he went to the
convention in 1960; he had something equally as im****tant -- he had West
Virginia behind him."
Obama has spent much of his time in recent days studiously ignoring
Clinton
and focusing on John McCain and the vote in November. He made a rare stop
in
West Virginia Monday, telling sup****ters in Charleston, "I understand that
many more here in West Virginia will probably sup****t Senator Clinton."
Later, Clinton's top strategist, Geoff Garin, told MSNBC that the campaign
would continue to push forward despite calls for her to forego the final
three weeks and the campaign's admission Sunday that it is at least $20
million in debt.
"We've already had one unfortunate experience with a leader declaring
'mission accomplished' when it really wasn't," Garin said, referring to
the
now infamous sign that greeted Bush aboard the U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln
following the fall of Baghdad in 2003.
Garin's admonition did nothing to halt the steady drip-drip-drip of
superdelegates to Obama, with four more announcing they were endorsing him
yesterday. Clinton's once-commanding lead among supers has eva****ated,
with
Obama now leading by 281 to 271.5, according to an Associated Press tally.
Obama, who is now about 150 overall delegates short of the 2,025 needed
for
the nomination under party rules, could hit that mark before the end of
the
primary season June 3 if the superdelegate trend continues.
Still, like a football player seeking refuge between the white lines,
Clinton seems to be having more fun these days than during more measured,
sedate and pressure-packed appearances as the front runner. And the
working-class crowds in the mill and mining towns were genuinely delighted
by her decision to adopt them as her own -- and with her unrestrained
attacks on oil companies, Chinese toy manufacturers and Wall Street money.
"It's good to hear her talk about gas prices. They're killing us," said
Donna Madden, 45, a part-time high school cafeteria employee from Clear
Fork. "She's an American, a real American. It's just good to know that she
has the same ancestors as us, that her family goes back for generations
and
generations and generations."
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