(Another) Presidential prediction UPDATE: revisionist history

Well, I blew that one, huh? My updated prediction yesterday buying into polls that had Hillary Clinton cutting Barack Obama's lead in North Carolina to single digits defied the logic I'd used two weeks earlier. I guess I should stuck with my first instinct on what would happen.

After Obama's 15-point win in North Carolina and a narrow loss to Clinton in Indiana, Obama has extended his lead in the popular vote and delegate count. The demographics are what Clinton will point to to justify her campaign continuing for four more weeks. But that's kinda like an 800-pound man pointing out he's lost 20 pounds. The raw number looks good, but what does it really mean in the grand scheme of things.

So I'll reverse-revise my predictions and say Obama grabs enough superdelegates in the end who see him being a more popular candidate than Clinton. As for November, I still see a tight race between Obama and McCain that will likely wind up coming down to what dirt the campaigns can dig up on each other.

In the meantime, Clinton did well enough in Indiana and with white voters to justify to herself that the race is worth staying in, thus prolonging Howard Dean's worst nightmare. Well, at least in this election. Could anything ever be a bigger nightmare for him than "The Scream" in 2004? But I digress. I think there's little doubt Obama will have an edge when everything wraps up June 3. The question is whether it will be enough to grant Dean's wish that the trailing candidate (Clinton) drop out to give the Democratic Party time to unify behind its nominee before the Democratic National Convention in August.