Perhaps Obama does have a problem, but not nearly as bad a problem as Hillary has in Colorado and other states where she will never ever be elected.

At this point, and based on exit polling data, his only problem is Hillary's advantage in name and branding. 10% of the voters decided in the booth and an additional 15% decided within the last week. For those that were undecideds, they broke fairly dramatically for Hillary and were the race. Given her name in PA and the Rendell machine, I don't think that is terribly surprising. The only thing surprising to me was the high number, 25% combined. That those voters couldn't decide until that late in the process tells me that he made significant progress with them but in the end they went with the "known" versus the unknown in Barack. Come November, that advantage hopefully will flow to Barack versus McCain given the amount of time he spent there for the primary.

The problem that Obama has is that he is new.

Yes, we know him now having watched him certainly for the last 14 to 15 months. Yet, average Americans 1) do not pay nearly as close attention to politics as pretty much anyone who reads blogs, etc. and 2) many of them are afraid of new things.

He is certainly the youngest looking candidate in a decades, even though Bill Clinton was actually younger in 1992 than Obama is today.

He is black. Enough said there. I'm sure we all know people who wouldn't vote for a minority of any sort for president even if that person was a Medal of Honor winner, cured the common cold, and built those people a new home. There are enough of those people who, more because of ignorance than rascism, just cannot bring themselves to vote for a black man.

Next, when you try to run a campaign of hope, unity, above board, and all those other good things, it becomes a bit harder to attack your opponent because than you look like a hypocrite. Unfortunately, as we have seen since the days of Lee Atwater, negative campaigning works.

Most Obama supporters don't have a problem with most of Hillary's proposals- although her nuclear umbrella for the entire Middle East is insane- we have a problem with her.

We know that more than 50% of American simply WILL NOT vote for her. She is the most polarizing figure in American political history- with maybe the exception of Abraham Lincoln (that comparison requires some thought).

She simply can not win in November...and she and her supporters are the only ones who do not realize that.

If she becomes the nominee...and loses, I can't wait to hear the griping from all the old white women who are her base. But when the GOP evicerates Social Security in a McCain presidency, then we can look those senior citizens in the face when they look for some one to blame... tell them to look in the mirror.

Barack being Hillary's VP would only be more likely because that would be a low price for Hillary to pay take the nomination. AS far as AAs not coming out for the ticket if Barack is only the VP, I can tell you that many would NOT. Look, people aren't stupid. If Hillary is given the nom. by party the supers AAs will not be sanguine just because Barack was offered the backseat!

The part that is missing here is that we are still in a battle where the focus is on these two Dems and once the nominee is settled and the party begins to come together and begin to compare with old John McSame; these record numbers of Dems who have been participating this year will change the map for either candidate to a degree and especially for Obama.

We all know that the pollsters this year just don't know how to account for all of these new or newly excited voters. This has all the makings of a game changer!

"Yes, we know [Obama] now having watched him certainly for the last 14 to 15 months. Yet, average Americans 1) do not pay nearly as close attention to politics as pretty much anyone who reads blogs, etc. and 2) many of them are afraid of new things."

How do you know what "average Americans" do or don't do as concerns politics? The same BS was said when Clinton was being impeached, and yet nearly 70 per cent supported Clintin against impeachment.

There are far toe many who hype their views -- exaggerate the validity of their hypotheses -- by speculating, with unequivocal certitude, about where "average Americans" are at without ever having talked to them. It reminds of Nixon's claim that he was supported by the "silent majority". As long as they remained silent, we couldn't know whether they were the majority or not. (It also effectively told those who supported him to any degree to shut up -- which kept them from being counted as to whethr they were a majority or a minority.)

I really get tired of know-it-alls who tell me what I think and believe without ever asking me.

A few observations. All Obama supporters (and I am a strong one) need to be honest with themselves and admit Hillary had a very strong showing in PA. I doubt name recognition was really a problem.

As I write, MSNBC (first airing of Hardball) is talking about a generational gap and the tremendously strong support among older white women for Clinton. Also, based on exit polls (slightly different numbers on MSNBC last night and the NY Times this AM), about 6.5 to 8 points of Clinton's 9.4 point margin can be attributed to voters who feel strongly about race. This probably shows racism having less of an impact than years ago, but its significance is still there. The numbers for older women on the whole seem to reflect strong feminist support among many women who grew up when opportunities for women were much more limited than today.

MSNBC is now talking about the white Catholic vote and how many Clinton supporters in that group would not support Obama if he gets the nomination. This country still has a long way to go to get rid of its prejudices, and probably never will.

My unhappiness is that we have a first rate candidate in Obama, someone attractive to younger people and the young at heart (people like me, despite being 74). We older people have got to recognize that all the benefits we have been getting will in the long run have to be paid for by our children and grandchildren, as will the tremendous Bush debts due to a war being fought, in my view, to avenge a failed assassination attempt against his father. It is time to give this country younger, more inspirational leadership, and as far as I'm concerned, that's Obama. If Hillary somehow manages to get the nomination, she will be a better choice than McCain, but let's not expect the kind of change that the country really needs.