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Curtain closes on long Democratic process, Hillary willing

May 29, 2008 — This just in: Ricky Martin, the Latin singing sensation, has endorsed Hillary Clinton in advance of the Democratic Presidential Primary in Puerto Rico. The entertainer has a good sense of timing – he’s doing his number right before the curtain comes down.

About all the deciding there is left for the Democrats to do has come down to just a few days, with Saturday’s Democratic National Committee rules and bylaws committee meeting in Washington to decide the Florida and Michigan questions (Floridians often stress the point that it’s really two questions) and next week’s valedictory primaries in Puerto Rico on Sunday and Montana and South Dakota on Tuesday. By this time next week, if most of the powers that can be assembled within the Democratic Party have their collective way, the party will have a presidential nominee.

Within that short span there is still time to squeeze out a little more drama. There’s already a long speaker’s list for the Clinton protest rally schedule to take place outside the DNC powwow on Saturday, and if Clinton’s campaign has any more Hail Mary’s left to throw, this weekend would be the time.

But the steady trickle of superdelegates moving into Barack Obama’s column is sure to increase when the primaries come to a close, and much of the rationale for an extended campaign evaporates when the last primary votes have been cast.

An Obama supporter maintained this week that the media has made a bigger deal of Clinton getting out of the race than the Obama campaign has. If the truth be known, he said, there has been some benefit for the fall campaign in the advertising and field organization work that has gone into the last primaries states.

“But once it’s over, there’s going to be the patience of a two-year-old for Hillary staying in,” he said.

Which Clinton, given the determination with which she has fought to regain the lead in this race, can’t be discounted from doing. She would do so at a greater cost than any she’s paid so far, however.

If Clinton bows out graciously next week, her victories in the final weeks of primaries will make a great start to a 2012 presidential campaign, should there by chance not be an incumbent Democratic president in the way. The flap over the Robert Kennedy comment will fade pretty quickly, and what will be remembered will be her appeal to heartland voters.

If she opts to fight on, that good will would for the most part be dissipated, and if Obama loses this fall she’s going to be blamed for protracting the nomination battle. Persuading a Clinton to quit, however, will be no easy matter.