By Arun Kumar, IANS
Washington : Staging a dramatic comeback, Hillary Clinton won the New Hampshire Democratic presidential primary late Tuesday night, stemming the popular wave for Barrack Obama who aims to be the first black president of the US.
In a surprisingly close contest, former first lady Clinton led by 39 to 37 percent votes over Iowa victor Obama, with 85 percent of the precincts counted. John Edwards, the Democrats’ 2004 vice presidential nominee, was a distant third with 17 percent.
Hillary told cheering supporters: “You deserve a president who stands up for the people.” She promised to “end the war in Iraq the right way” and “to restore American credibility throughout the world”.
“Together we’ll give America the kind of comeback that you have given me tonight,” said Clinton as Obama conceded – despite having a 10-13 point lead in most opinion polls before the tiny state went to polls.
Failing to continue his victory run, Obama said he was “still fired up and ready to go”. Congratulating Clinton for her win, Obama praised “all the candidates in this race” as “patriots who serve this country honourably”.
The win over Obama gave the Clinton campaign a shot in the arm as the state-by-state nomination process headed towards Feb 5 “Super Tuesday” when voters in 22 of the 50 states pick presidential candidates.
On the Republican side, Vietnam War veteran Senator John McCain defeated former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney with 37 to 32 percent vote, reviving a campaign that had been given up for dead just a few months ago. Speaking to his supporters, McCain said: “Tonight we sure showed them what a comeback looks like”.
Romney, who also finished second in last week’s Iowa caucuses but won the Wyoming caucus, said he was looking forward to the Jan 15 primary in Michigan – where he was born and where his father was governor.
“I’ll fight to be back here in November,” Romney said. “I’ll fight to make sure we strengthen our homes and our families… by strengthening our economy.”
Iowa Republican caucus winner Mike Huckabee, the former governor of Arkansas, said he’s “seen momentum build” in the last few weeks and pledged to ride it to the Republican nomination, despite his third-place (12 percent) finish in the New Hampshire primary.
“If there’s any sadness tonight,” he said, “it’s not because of where we finished because, whew, we’re pretty happy about that.”
Reflecting the intense statewide interest in the contest in both parties, turnout approached record levels and New Hampshire’s independent voters most likely were the ones who decided both parties’ races.
As they had in Iowa, Democrats cited a desire for change through their votes. Republicans said leadership and personal qualities were more important to them than positions on the issues.
Earlier, as opinion polls showed his wife trailing Obama in the first-in-the-nation primary state, former president Bill Clinton criticised the media for not pressing Obama more fully on Iraq, and accused the Illinois senator of shifting his position to reflect changing attitudes on the war.
“Give me a break. This whole thing is the biggest fairytale I’ve ever seen,” he said, suggesting Obama went through 15 debates trumpeting his superior judgement and how he had been against the war without being questioned.
Clinton also suggested that Obama’s campaign had employed underhanded tactics against his wife, Hillary. “What did you think about the Obama thing calling Hillary the senator from Punjab? Did you like that?” he asked.
Part of Time magazine’s list of Top 10 Campaign Gaffes, Obama’s supporters last June referred to Clinton as ‘Hillary Clinton, D-Punjab’ – journalistic shorthand for Democratic senator from Punjab – in a jab at her work on behalf of Indian-Americans.
An Obama campaign memo also accused the then Democratic front-runner of getting “tens of thousands” from companies that outsource jobs to India.
As the Indian-American community took umbrage, denouncing his memo as “the worst kind of anti-Indian American stereotyping”, Obama quickly made amends by apologising for the “Punjab jab”.
Later, responding to Clinton’s comments, Obama said the Clinton campaign was “frustrated”, and dismissed the notion the press has been easy on him.
“Maybe I’ve been missing something, but it seems like you guys have been reporting on me the entire year,” Obama told reporters.
“I remember this summer when we were down 20 points, we were getting knocked around pretty good. And I didn’t hear the Clinton camp complaining about how terrible the press was.”