By Arun Kumar, IANS,
Washington : Barack Obama has secured the Democratic presidential nomination to make history as the first black to lead a major party ticket in America, but vanquished rival Hillary Clinton still has not called it quits.
A split verdict in the final primaries in Montana and South Dakota coupled with a last-minute rush of Democratic super delegates Tuesday pushed Obama over the threshold of 2,118 delegates needed to clinch the nomination at the party’s convention in Denver this August.
“You chose to listen not to your doubts or your fears, but to your greatest hopes and highest aspirations,” said Obama, the son of a black Kenyan father and white American mother, at a rally in St. Paul, Minnesota, to claim the Democratic nomination.
“Tonight, we mark the end of one historic journey with the beginning of another – a journey that will bring a new and better day to America. Because of you, tonight, I can stand before you and say that I will be the Democratic nominee for president of the United States.”
Obama needed 41 delegates to effectively claim the nomination as the polling began in the two states Tuesday. But just as the polls began to close, super delegates, who hold the balance of power in a tight race as they are not bound by the primary results, started rallying behind Obama.
Among those endorsing Obama Tuesday was former president Jimmy Carter who like other senior party officials had been patiently waiting in the wings for the primaries to end.
For the record, Clinton did win the primary in South Dakota by a double-digit margin, while Obama did so in Montana to proportionately share the 31 delegates from the two states.
Clinton, who hoped to become the first woman president, acknowledged at a rally of her own in New York that she had finally run into a dead end after five months of a fierce and bitter struggle, but she still did not leave the race.
“This has been a long campaign and I will be making no decisions tonight,” Clinton said amid reports that she would be open to becoming Obama’s vice presidential running mate if an offer came her way. She said she would be speaking with party officials about her next move.
In a combative speech, she again presented her case that she was the stronger candidate and argued that she had won the popular vote, a notion disputed by the Obama campaign. “I want the 18 million Americans who voted for me to be respected,” she said to loud cheers.
At the same time Clinton acknowledged the incredible run of Obama, who served as an Illinois state senator just four years ago saying: “It has been an honour to contest the primaries with him, just as it has been an honour to call him my friend.”
Under the US system, the party nominees are not picked up by the popular vote. It’s the delegates elected in the name of a particular candidate at the primaries who choose the candidate at the party convention.
Meanwhile, on a conference call Tuesday with Democratic lawmakers from New York, Clinton was asked whether she would be open to joining a ticket with Obama. She replied that she would do whatever she could – including a vice presidential bid – to help Democrats win the White House.
Nydia M. Velásquez, a member of the US House of Representatives asked Clinton whether she would consider teaming up with Obama. “She said that if it’s offered, she would take it,” Velásquez said.
“If Senator Obama asked her to be the vice president, she certainly would accept that,” said another Democratic representative Carolyn McCarthy. “She has obviously given some thought to this.”
Clinton said she would do “anything to make sure a Democrat would win”, according to several participants on the call.
While her advisers played down the remark’s significance, the Democrats on the call said that by not demurring or saying she would simply think about it, they said they were left with the impression that it was an offer that she wanted to at least consider.
Neither Obama nor his associates commented on the speculation and he made no reference to it in his speech Tuesday evening in Minnesota, which was delivered at the same arena in which John McCain is expected to formally accept the Republican nomination at the party’s convention in September.
However, he did compliment his gritty rival. “Our party and our country are better off because of her,” Obama said, “and I am a better candidate for having had the honour to compete with Hillary Rodham Clinton.”
The end of the primary season shifts the presidential campaign to a new phase as Obama and presumptive Republican nominee McCain start training their guns on each other in the run up to the November presidential election.