Clinton lost in Maine on Sunday, a day after the New York senator and former first lady was stung by defeats in Nebraska, Washington state, Louisiana and the U.S. Virgin Islands. She is struggling to overcome Obama's financial and political rally that came on the back of his impressive showing in last week's "Super Tuesday" series of Democratic contests in 22 states.
The Democratic nomination is far from decided, with weeks or months of campaigning still ahead. Clinton is an experienced, well-financed campaigner certainly capable of pulling off more surprise wins, as she did Jan. 8 in New Hampshire.
In the latest overall totals in The Associated Press count, Clinton had 1,136 delegates to 1,108 for Obama. The totals include so-called superdelegates, which are party leaders not chosen at primaries or caucuses, free to change their minds. A total of 2,025 delegates is required to win the nomination.
In Maine, with 99 percent of the participating precincts reporting, Obama led with 59 percent of the vote, to 40 percent for Clinton. Obama won 15 of Maine's delegates to the national convention and Clinton won nine.
Obama, who seeks to be the U.S.'s first black president, was buoyant after his weekend winning sweep. He even won a Grammy on Sunday for his audio version of his book "The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts On Reclaiming The American Dream," beating former Presidents Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter in the best spoken word album category.
"I have the ability to bring people together," he said. Because of that, he said, "I think I can beat John McCain more effectively," he said, challenging the presumptive Republican nominee for November general elections.
WASHINGTON - Barack Obama scored a clean sweep of five weekend contests, eroding rival Hillary Rodham Clinton's narrow lead in the Democratic presidential race and prompting the former first lady to reshuffle her campaign staff in a bid to stop his momentum.
For now, at least, the wind is at Obama's back. Clinton replaced campaign manager Patti Solis Doyle with longtime aide Maggie Williams ahead of nomination races Tuesday in Virginia, Maryland, and Washington, D.C., where polls published Sunday showed Obama leading.
The two states and the U.S. capital all have a sizable number of black Democratic voters, a constituency that has aided Obama in earlier contests.
McCain, too, was nursing Saturday and Sunday losses. He took the weekend off from campaigning despite embarrassing, but not pivotal, losses against preacher-turned-politician Mike Huckabee in two Republican races on Saturday. Huckabee, a favorite of evangelical Christians, beat McCain in Kansas and Louisiana, highlighting the difficulty the veteran Arizona senator faces in convincing the party's core right-wing blocs that he is one of them.
McCain, however, remained far ahead of Huckabee in the delegate count, and retained his virtually assured nomination that came on the back of rival Mitt Romney's decision to suspend his campaign. McCain has 719 delegates out of a total 1,191 needed to secure the Republican nomination. Huckabee had 234 delegates.
Since his string of Super Tuesday wins, McCain has concentrated on wooing conservatives who view him as a political maverick on key issues like immigration and tax cuts. The former Vietnam prisoner-of-war and decorated Navy pilot secured a boost Sunday when Bush referred to him in a taped interview as a "true conservative." But the president also stressed that McCain must do more to win over conservatives.
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