Clinton campaign's new strategy ... vote for Chelsea in 2016



The souvenir vendors outside Hillary Clinton's campaign appearances have added a new badge to their wares that reads "Chelsea in 2016" with a picture of the former first daughter.

Attention, whether from badge sellers or the national media, is leaving the fading presidential candidacy of Senator Hillary Clinton behind as the former front-runner faces what most see as impossible odds to win the Democratic nomination.

Now in the spotlight is her rival, fellow Senator Barack Obama, who has solidified his lead among Democrats and is setting his sights on Republican candidate John McCain in the November election.

Chip off the block: Chelsea Clinton speaks before her mother at a retirement community in Boca Raton, Florida

While Mr Obama and Mr McCain spar - the two clashed this week over whether the United States should talk to leaders of hostile nations - Mrs Clinton's struggle to collect votes in Florida that were cast months ago but invalidated feels like a sideshow.

Mr Obama's milestone victory in Oregon on Tuesday that gave him a majority of pledged delegates to the Democratic nominating convention graced front pages of U.S. newspapers.

Mrs Clinton's simultaneous victory in Kentucky, which did little to close her gap with Mr Obama, was a much smaller story.

"The shrinking candidacy of Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton all but vanished from the television set," wrote The New York Times.

Either will do: Ricardo Marquez holds pictures of the two Democratic presidential candidate during a Clinton's campaign event at the University of Miami

Even calls for the former first lady to drop out have abated, whether because she seems less of a threat to damage Mr Obama or because she paid them no heed.

Despite a campaign deeply in debt, she vows to compete through the last primaries on June 3.

After the mixed results in Oregon and Kentucky, Mrs Clinton soldiered on this week in Florida which, along with Michigan, saw its January primaries invalidated because they were held earlier than Democratic Party rules allowed.

She won both primaries and wants the votes counted and the delegates seated.

She maintains she would lead Mr Obama in the popular vote if both states were counted. Although delegates select the party nominees, contenders such as Mrs Clinton hope to win uncommitted superdelegates, who can back any candidate.

Vote push: Clinton supporters hold a count Florida and Michigan votes sign, during the Solutions for America event at Century Village West, Boca Raton, Florida

In Florida, Clinton's speeches were part civics lesson, part call to action and part comparison to the state's voting recount in 2000.

Voting confusion in south Florida left the contest between Republican George W. Bush and Democrat Al Gore undecided, but a controversial U.S. Supreme Court decision resolved the race in favor of Bush. Gore won the popular vote.

"We are still arguing, aren't we, for counting all the votes back in 2000, and we should be just as passionately arguing for that principle today, here in Florida and in Michigan," Mrs Clinton told retirees in Boca Raton.

As she spoke, an elderly man sitting behind her, directly in the eye of television cameras, yawned deeply, rubbed his eyes and battled to stay awake.

Core support: People line up to attend an event with Democratic presidential hopeful U.S. Senator Hillary Clinton in Boca Raton

Campaign debt: New York Senator Hillary Clinton

Despite Mrs Clinton's efforts, Mr Obama holds what almost everyone outside her campaign and her hardcore supporters sees as a nearly insurmountable mathematical lead in party delegates.



So much so, many political observers have written off her campaign as a lesson in recent history.

"Hillary Clinton's Defeat: A Historic Triumph" declared a headline on the Huffington Post, a news and politics Web site.

On Slate, a commentary site, correspondent John Dickerson wrote: "Forget maths majors -- what about science?"

"The race for the Democratic nomination -- 'race' is hardly the right word, is it? -- now feels like a quantum physics problem: How long can a body exist in a state approximating motionlessness without actually stopping?" he wrote.



But for supporters like Nora Blake, 85, who listened to Mrs Clinton speak at a senior citizens center in Sunrise, Florida, the media and the Democratic Party are to blame for unfairly dismissing the New York senator's candidacy.

"I don't understand why they are so anti-Hillary," said the retiree from Brooklyn, New York. "The Democratic Party is dismissing her, the Democratic National Committee is dismissing her. I think they should all be junked."

Mrs Clinton's staff tried to stir up enthusiasm for her ongoing campaign among the exhausted reporters trailing her around Florida and griping that editors at home don't care about any Clinton story unless she dropped out of the race.

"I'm not hearing the excitement," one campaign aide said as the candidate's plane landed in Palm Beach and a second aide launched into a rehearsed speech on Clinton's strategy.

"Did you hear that?" another aide prodded a reporter. "A little bit," the reporter replied.