Obama Sweeps Primaries: is it the Turning Point?

By Anastacia Mott Austin

"It’s been a long, a long time coming but I know…a change gonna come, oh yes it will."
-Sam Cooke

This could be it, folks. The steam gathering beneath Democratic Presidential candidate Barack Obama in recent weeks may have finally pushed him over a decisive edge with this week’s most recent primaries in Virginia, Maryland, and the District of Columbia.

In the District of Columbia, Obama won a landslide 75% of the vote, and 64% in Virginia. With two-thirds of precincts reporting, he had also won 60% in Maryland.

This now places him firmly, if narrowly, ahead of Hillary Clinton in the all-important delegate race, which has become a too-close-to-call nail-biter in the past several weeks.

This also bodes well for Obama’s hope to claim more of the "super-delegates," Democratic party officials who may change their votes at any time. If Obama continues to trounce Clinton in upcoming primaries, many of those super-delegates may well lean toward Obama. Representatives from the Obama campaign claim that, even counting the super-delegates, he is ahead.

The Clinton camp has been dogged of late by reports that Hillary Clinton loaned her own campaign $5 million and is struggling to raise funds, and by the shakeup in her campaign staff, with both the manager and deputy manager stepping down.

And as momentum gathers behind the Obama campaign, the answer to the question of his electability has been a resounding "yes."

It may have helped that a recent poll released by TIME shows that if a Presidential match-up were to occur today, Clinton and McCain would virtually tie, while Obama would win over McCain by several percentage points.

McCain supporters aren’t willing to throw in the towel quite yet, however. McCain all but sealed his bid as the Republican nominee, handily winning in the Virgina, Maryland, and D.C. primaries over his now-closest opponent Mike Huckabee. Virginia voters chose McCain, who garnered 50%. In the District of Columbia, McCain received 68% of votes, and 55% with two-thirds of precincts in Maryland reporting.

Huckabee won over more conservative voters, but it was not enough to topple McCain’s lead. Many Republican primary states hand over their delegates in winner-take-all, which boosts McCain, while Clinton and Obama play tug-of-war as each gets a proportional percentage of the delegates.

But while seven out of ten Republican primary voters said in exit polls that they would be "satisfied" if McCain became their candidate, only four in ten would be "very satisfied."

You can bet that Obama supporters are not having that problem. They are undoubtedly feeling very satisfied indeed to see the "candidate for change" take a decisive lead over what they see as his establishment opponent.

It has been a long time coming, but change may indeed be on the horizon…..at least in the Democratic race to be the party’s nominee.