Are there signs that they are becoming less enthusiastic?

If at the end of August in Denver Hillary Clinton is crowned as her party’s presidential nominee then there is one demographic segment she can thank the most – white women.

Throughout the campaign the ex-first lady has consistently led amongst this group who, it will be recalled, first made their presence felt when they flocked to the polls in New Hampshire at the start of January and helped her pull off a spectacular victory.

In each contest since then they have gone on exerting an enormous influence and look set to play a key part in the Pennsylvania primary a week tomorrow.

But are they as important as they were? Is there evidence that whilst still being overwhelmingly important to Hillary she might not be able to rely on them as she was able to until a month ago?

This is analysed by in an interesting piece by David Lightman – part of which is reproduced above. A theme he found was concern amongst some older women about the way the Clinton campaign had been run and also a desire that the contest should end soon.

A real challenge in Pennsylvania, and no doubt in the other remaining states, is Obama’s financial fire-power. Having the resources to outspend his opponent several times over gives him the reach and the ability to get carefully crafted messages out to target voting groups.

The new attack rhetoric from the Clinton camp is to accuse him of being elitist – the reason Bill Clinton is now saying why Al Gore and John Kerry both lost.

There’s still fight left in the Hillary campaign but Pennsylvania is crucial. She needs a decisive victory there in territory where should be prosper.

The Obama betting price has eased just a touch in the past few days following Obama’s “bitter” remarks. As for next week’s primary the Pennsylvania handicap market looks interesting.

Mike Smithson