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Sen. Barack Obama dominated yesterdays Potomac primaries by easily winning the Democratic contests in the District, Maryland and Virginia running his victory streak to eight in a row Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton looked to tamp down her rivals rising momentum in the delegate-rich states to come.

Mr. Obama, of Illinois, was poised to bypass Mrs. Clinton in the race for delegates, but the senator from New York was expected to win enough votes in Virginia and Maryland to keep the presidential nomination contest in a virtual dead heat. In the key swing state of Virginia, Mr. Obama defeated Mrs. Clinton 63 percent to 35 percent with 2,097 of 2,472 precincts reporting, or 85 percent. “Today, the change we seek swept through the Chesapeake and over the Potomac,” Mr. Obama said at a rally in Wisconsin, site of the next contest Tuesday. “The cynics can no longer say our hope is false,” he said last night, in a reference to one of Mrs. Clinton’s talking points. Mr. Obama continued to gain support among both men and women, in nearly every age group and from across racial lines. Exit polls in Virginia showed Mr. Obama even winning among white men, only the second time he won that segment of the vote in a Southern state. He split the overall white vote with Mrs. Clinton. She won her base, white women, and he won 90 percent of the black vote. In Maryland, where Anne Arundel County Judge Ronald A. Silkworth ordered that the polls be held open an additional 90 minutes due to bad whether, Mr. Obama was immediately declared the winner at 9:31 by the Associated Press and several networks. Minutes later, Mr. Obama was declared the District’s winner.

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