The State of the Race

Lets stipulate a few things.
(1) Hillary Clinton is not, by staying in the race, going to win the nomination. She is hopelessly behind in number of states won, certainly going to lose the pledged delegate count, incredibly likely going to end up with less of the popular vote, and increasingly in trouble with the superdelegates. (Since OH, during some of his worst weeks of the campaign, Obama has picked up something like 2x the number of supers than she has).
(2) Staying in the race does not give her much more credibility to be the nominee if Obama has a colossal skeleton fall out of his closet before the convention, as she could still sweep in during such an unlikely scenario.
(3) Despite the fact that the math has not really changed since March 4, the media is no longer going to give HRC a free ride on the chances of her being the nominee. Starting last night, as the pundits saw an ever diminishing Clinton lead in Indiana, the narrative quickly became Hillary Clinton: the candidate without a chance. Even if there is a pathway to the nomination (necessarily including Florida and Michigan, and trying eek out a lead in the popular vote, thereby convincing the superdelegates to turn to her), the media seems unwilling to continue to give her the benefit of that doubt.

When you think about this, and a whole lot else, it is easy to justify calls for Clinton to exit the race. In fact, some who have supported her are already making that call. It is much more interesting, however, to think about the advantages of a continued Clinton presidential campaign, albeit one with a much different purpose and tone than has been the case for the last few weeks.

Mark Ambinder's "7 Reasons Why Clinton Should Stay In The Race" contains some very interesting things to think about, and that I hope the Clinton campaign is thinking about.

In particular I'd like to highlight:
(1) Florida and Michigan - If Clinton drops out, Florida and Michigan's delegates may be seated. This is good. I'm not sure, however, if the damage to the Demotratic party's reputation can be repaired as effectively as if Clinton is able to make a deal with the Obama campaign (behind closed doors) trading a seating of the delegates for her dropping out. There is a subtle but important difference here. If Clinton stays in the race and the delegations are seated, Florida and Michigan voters will have a champion for their cause, and once she endorsses Obama, they will likley move that way as well.

(3) Embarrassment - Obama's campaign says they are willing to "take our chances" with a Clinton-less election in WV. I wouldn't be as confident as they are, particularly with the party as polorized as it currently is, that Obama will win. This is particularly the case if her voters feel upset and vote in protest for their candidate, and Obama's supporters have much less motivation to turn out with the election all but certain. This could be incredibly problematic from my point of view. Despite his mathematical lock, it is important for the Obama campaign to truly understand that they are going to get the nomination with very slightly more than half of the electorate. If he can't even win states when he is really the only person running, this could be seen as particularly damaging, and a sign that the party is not willing to coalesce behind him. And we all know how these talking-heads talking-points turn into the truth rather than act as a reflection of it.

(5) The Party - This is the most important, and from what I can tell, least thought about, of Ambinder's points. With both candidates continuing the campaign into the rest of the states, they are building organizations and mobilizing voters that will be invaluable in the fall. This is done with money that can't be spent on the general election and in states where Democrats generally don't have a whole lot of infrastructure. This is a unique opportunity.

To these points I would only add one more:

With Obama as the only candidate from our party still in the race, there are two effects on John McCain. (1) He just can't quite credibly attack one candidate. Yes, he has been taking shots at Obama, but they seem to receive less attention and fall a bit flat. This is good for us for obvious reasons. (2) He gets less media attention. Once we shift into "general election mode" the campaign is going to start providing more coverage to all of these weekly campaign themes that have been going on. Yes, they have been covering a bit, but not as much as they will. Less media time for McCain the better. That doesn't mean that the party in general, and Obama in particular, can't go after McCain, it just means the media won't be obsessing over the GOP quite yet.

All of this is dependent, of course, on one thing: A positive message from Hillary Clinton. The remaining phase of her campaign could be about the Democratic party, her history and accomplishments, and her policy proposals. It should not be about Obama, or even be a contrast to an Obama candidacy. This has the advantage of, at the moment being good politics. Going negative didn't seem to work against Obama (think Wright, Bittergate, and Gas Tax Holiday). She won PA by 9 points, a good accomplishment but not the blowout that was expected, and she got less of the vote in NC and IN than expected. She can continue to connect with blue collar voters and champion their issues (John Edwards, anyone?) . In addition, this will give her the opportunity to rebuild her image, particularly with the party elite. Such a tactic, through negotiations, could be beneficial in other ways. She could negotiate a retiring of her campaign debt, possibly wrangle the offer of the VP Slot, and build credibility with the rest of the party.

Bottom line is, the Clinton campaign is not going to withdraw right away. She has sent staff to South Dakota, continues to have them in Oregon and has events planned in both states, plus West Virginia and Kentucky. If she continues to run the campaign she has in the last month, the negative reputation she has (re)developed is likely deserved. If she stays in the campaign but changes the purpose and tone of her project, she can potentially make up a lot of the ground that the Party has lost since March 4.