Pa. Ground War Comes To End

Pennsylvania voters held the future of Hillary Clinton’s presidential run in their grasp Tuesday, as the first primary contest since early March promised an end, at least, to six weeks of Democratic political trench warfare in the Keystone State.

Turnout appeared brisk as voters seemed to sense the high stakes. For Barack Obama, Pennsylvania offered the potential for an upset that could finally end a primary battle that has morphed into nothing short of a Democratic civil war.

For Clinton, with polls showing her maintaining a single-digit lead, a convincing win is essential to buttress her argument for staying in the race, despite Obama’s lead in pledged delegates and growing angst among Democratic elders about party unity in time for the fall campaign.

Obama began the night with a delegate lead, 1648.5-1509.5, out of 2,025 needed to win the nomination. The prize in Pennsylvania: 158 delegates.

Exit polls showed women cast about 60 percent of the votes, and that turnout among older voters was high. Voters also had a dim view of the economy - more than 80 percent said the nation is already in a recession, according to interviews conducted by The Associated Press and the TV networks.

 Nearly one quarter of Pennsylvania Democrats - 23 percent - decided who to vote for in the last week, according to exit polls. And more than half said the economy was their most important issue.

As they prepared for real vote tallies to replace exit poll projections, both sides readied for a particularly active night of spin. Clinton has always been favored to win Pennsylvania, given her family roots in the state and the favorable demographics it offers her campaign.  If she doesn’t win by at least high single-digits, her aides will be faced with convincing the media that the victory should not be viewed as an overall set-back.

"I think a win is a win. Maybe I'm old fashioned about that," Clinton insisted to reporters Tuesday. "I think maybe the question ought to be, why can't he close the deal with his extraordinary financial advantage? Why can't he win a state like this one if that's the way it turns out ... big states, states that Democrats have to win."

Obama, meanwhile, has worked to lower expectations – flatly stating that he expects Clinton to win – while making a furious push over the past few weeks to finish better than expected in Pennsylvania and possibly finish the New York senator off.

"We think we've made enormous progress" though "it's an uphill battle," Obama said as he greeted patrons at a Pittsburgh diner Tuesday. He noted that polls show a tighter race than just a few weeks ago, but said: "We still, I think, have to consider ourselves the underdog."

Later in the day, however, he told XM Radio: “If Senator Clinton gets over 50 percent she’s won the state, and I don’t try and pretend that I enjoy getting only 45 percent and that’s a moral victory. You’ve lost the state.”

Both sides were closely watching turnout for signs of advantage or weakness. If more than 2.3 million of the 4.2 million registered party members came out to vote Tuesday, it would set a modern record for the state's Democratic presidential primary.

The current record - of just under 55 percent - was set in 1980, when Senator Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) narrowly defeated President Carter in the state’s primary.

Some Pennsylvania voters couldn’t be blamed if they were ready to collapse in exhaustion after a barrage of ads and visits and barbed campaign rhetoric on a scale that normally is reserved for traditional early states like Iowa and New Hampshire.

Obama reported spending $11.2 million on television in the state, compared with $4.8 for Clinton. And that doesn’t begin to measure the blanket free media coverage that was fueled by controversies about Obama (comments by his former pastorand his own “poor word choices” about the bitterness of working-class voters) and Clinton (a gaffe about the alleged dangers of a 1996 trip to Bosnia-Herzegovina).

Bill Clinton also remained in the headlines even as voters headed to the polls. The former president told a Philadelphia radio station Monday that despite widespread criticism for his racially-charged comments during the South Carolina primary in January, he felt Obama’s campaign “had played the race card” on him.

On Tuesday, Clinton disputed his previous interview, a tape of which was readily available on the Web. “No, no, no, that's not what I said," Clinton said during a visit to a Pittsburgh voting site. “You always follow me around and play these little games. And I am not going to play your games today.”

Barring an upset – and the 2008 cycle has already seen its share of those – political observers expect the Clinton-Obama grudge match to move on to Indiana and North Carolina on May 6. Indiana, a state that offers neither candidate an obvious advantage, may loom particularly large.

In the meantime, both candidates were assuring their followers that no matter who wins the nomination, the party will come together to defeat John McCain, who was also on the Pennsylvania ballot Tuesday.

Clinton, speaking to reporters in Conshohocken, said she'd campaign for a united Democratic Party no matter the primary outcome.

"Anybody who supports Barack or me would be very foolish to think voting for Senator McCain makes any sense," she said.

Ben Smith contributed to this report.