The Chicagoist will be launching later but in the meantime please enjoy our archives.

Sweeps Week for Obama

By Kevin Robinson in News on Feb 13, 2008 2:00PM

Barack Obama swept the Potomac Primary last night, bringing his winning streak to eight, and eclipsing Hillary Clinton in the delegate count, 1,059 to 956 among pledged delegates.

John McCain continued his march to the nomination, winning all three states and adding to his already substantial delegate lead. Mike Huckabee came close in Virginia, doing well in rural areas and losing the state by less than 50,000 votes. He vowed last night to stay in the race and challenge McCain until the end. "There is still a sense in the Republican Party to have a choice," Huckabee said after the close race in Virginia. "Just a few days ago... a lot of the polls showed me behind by 30 points.... Yesterday, we closed within 11 or 12. Maybe if we had a few more days we could have closed the gap all the way."

2008_2_obama_potomac_primary.jpgObama won all three primaries last night by a landslide, as was expected. He also broke about even with Clinton among whites in Virginia according to exit polls. And he passed another crucial test, as Virginia was the first Southern state where Obama won among white men.

Clinton still leads Obama among superdelegates, 234 to 156 according to CNN, although that number may change as the primaries wear on. Its too soon to start writing Hillary's political obituary, but there has been little good news coming out of her camp lately. Her campaign manager resigned Sunday evening, and last night Mike Henry, her deputy campaign manager resigned. She's loaned her campaign millions of dollars, and two key players from her Internet team have quit as well. Those aren't the kinds of things that happen when you're winning. Clinton has set her sights on Ohio and Texas, making March 4 a likely do-or-die vote for her.

Image via Barack Obama