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Hillary Clinton wrote a new chapter in her personal saga of catastrophe and redemption in an Ohio ballroom tonight, claiming a victory in the name of all of those who have ever tasted defeat.
As brightly coloured strips of confetti swirled in the updraft, it was a humbler version of Clinton who emerged to greet her supporters at a former Masonic temple in Columbus.
Framed by hundreds of arms stretched overhead with cellphones and cameras, Clinton appeared on stage alone except for her daughter Chelsea - and she immediately tried to tie her victory to all those who had recovered from disappointment.
"This nation is coming back and so is this campaign," she said.
Except of course this was a crowd that had never counted Clinton out - even after Obama racked up a dozen victories in a row and fellow Democrats called on her to pull out of the race.
"All I have to say is I told you so," said Stephanie Tubbs Jones, a member of Congress from Cleveland.
Jones, who is African American, had been under pressure from some of her black constituents to switch her ardent support for Clinton to Obama. But she kept the faith, as did Clinton's supporters who spent the day trooping into to her campaign headquarters. They drove voters to the polls, telephoned voters from their cellphones, and stood on street corners in the freezing rain encouraging drivers to honk for Hillary.
"I think she is just amazing," said Judy Kress, who woke up at 4am to volunteer as a polling monitor.
The surge of support translated to the ballot box where Clinton reclaimed the white vote from Obama, including the votes of white males.
With more than 80% of the votes counted, Clinton had 56% of the vote against 42% for Obama. The strong finish in Ohio surprised even Clinton insiders, some of whom had travelled from Washington and New York to help out on the campaign.
Clinton immediately sought to use the scale of her victory in Ohio to propel her into the next big battleground state in neighbouring Pennsylvania.
"If we want a Democratic president we need a Democratic noominee who can win battleground states just like Ohio and that is just what we have done," Clinton said and then went on to list the dozen contests ahead.
In the back of the crowd, a woman held up a sign reading: "Meet me in Indiana."
But it was several hours before anyone in the ballroom was ready to believe that Clinton would ever get that far. As the hours stretched by after close of polls in Ohio, campaign insiders with access to exit polls fretted that the contest was closer than they expected. The campaign workers crammed into the ballroom passed the time speculating on whether the momentum really would slip away from Obama with a Clinton win.
Without a clear result in Ohio they were not quite ready to believe. The results in Rhode Island gave a momentary boost -- but not for long.
"I need you all excited. It's a big election night," an organiser on the stage pleaded. There was a ritualistic chant of Hill-a-ree.
But as everyone in the ballroom recognised by night's end, Clinton's win in Ohio had changed the dynamic of the race for the White House. "This will shove her all the way," said Jerry Pramik, who had been helping out on the campaign since losing his job last week.
Ohio's governor, Ted Strickland, who had been crucial to Clinton's victory in the state, had a more elegant formulation. But the premise was essentially the same: Clinton's night of big wins demanded that the race be allowed to continue through the last contest of the primary season in Puerto Rico in June.
Strickland also argued that the Democrats would be making a mistake to overlook Clinton's strong victory in Ohio -- a battleground state in general elections. Even if tonight's win is not enough to close the gap with Obama in the delegate count, it would be folly to disregard Clinton's wins in big states such as California, New York, and New Jersey, he said.
"Hillary Clinton has proven tonight that when she has a fair chance with adequate resources she wins," Strickland told the crowd. "So I want to say to you and I say to America let her continue to fight." |