Is it time to start using our White House race logo?

With Obama’s decisive victory in North Carolina and Hillary’s victory in Indiana being by a fraction it’s starting to look as though the marathon fight for the Democratic nomination is nearing its end. As Obama spinners were saying overnight – they are now just 200 delegates from clinching it.

Add onto that the reports that she has had to make a further big loan to her campaign and you get a picture of the challenges she faces. The Clintons are moderately wealthy – but how long will others fund what increasingly looks like a doomed venture.

All the predictions ahead of the latest two primaries in Indiana and North Carolina were that she would lose the latter – but she needed to win the former by a big enough margin to convince the party establishment that she still had a case. She’s got a victory but is it big enough?

Her whole strategy was based on stretching this out until the August convention in August and then using the disputed Florida and Michigan delegation issues to bang her case home. That required, more than anything, momentum in the final phases of the primary campaign. The tightness of the Indiana result might just have sealed her fate.

It’s too early for the number crunching to have been completed but Obama is certain to have bettered his position in both the overall pledged delegate count and the popular vote.

So it’s increasingly looking like a McCain-Obama run-off and the serious scrutiny, for the first time, will be on the 72 year old with a furious temper. My 50/1 Obama bet is looking even better.

Mike Smithson