Election Update

Couldn't stay up late last night to get all the results...but you probably know them by now.

Big...BIG...wins for Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York over Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois in Texas and Ohio. The wins weren't "thumpins" as President Bush called the Republican Party defeats in 2006 at the hands of the Democrats, but they were good enough.

Sen. Clinton won Ohio by ten points, 54-44 percent, and scraped a win in Texas by four points, 51-47. It is not yet clear how the delegate breakdown will be tabulated because of the complex Democratic Party fules. But what is clear is this:

The race is far from over. This was Sen. Obama's chance to drive the stake into the heart of the Clinton campaign but he did not do it. Sen. Clinton lives to fight again.

RealClearPolitics.com estimates that Sen. Clinton is now within 100 total delegates of Sen. Obama including those "superdelegates" (unelected party insiders who have votes at the Democratic Party convention in August) who have publicly committed to either candidate.

She is also close behind in the popular vote totals for all the primaries.

I am not sure if I am ready to say that she has the momentum now quite yet. After all, Sen. Obama won 12 straight primaries through last night until Sen. Cilnton won Rhode Island (which along with Vermont, Ohio, and Texas were voting on March 4). But you can say his momentum has stopped for the moment.

I will have a lot more to say later as I digest these results but this race, as most analysts will now say, is far from over and will likely extend right through to the end. Sen. Obama now faces the pressure of having to win a big state in a primary; not just rack up big wins in small state caucuses.

As they say, overnight is a lifetime in politics.

And kudos to John McCain, the Republican Party presidential nominee who clinched the nomination with landslide wins in Texas and Ohio last night. His principal rival, former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee gracefully withdrew, and now Sen. McCain goes about the task of pulling his party together around his candidacy. He will go to the White House to get the endorsement of President Bush in the next day or two.

This is a remarkable political comeback in what is a remarkable political year. If it were not for the excitement on the Democratic Party side, this would have been the major story of the evening.

More later, gotta run!