Clinton presses on, urges supporters to ignore calls to quit

By BETH FOUHY

Associated Press Writer

SIOUX FALLS, S.D. --

Her voice raspy, her tone determined, Hillary Rodham Clinton urged her supporters Thursday to ignore the political pundits who have declared her toast.

The former first lady raced into a long West Virginia-to-the-West Coast campaign day, declaring she would move forward with her presidential effort and insisting anew that she, not Barack Obama, would be the stronger Democratic candidate to face Republican John McCain in November.

But her fresh comments about race dogged her as she pressed forward with her struggling candidacy.

In an interview with USA Today published Thursday, Clinton said, "I have a much broader base to build a winning coalition on." She cited an Associated Press article "that found how Senator Obama's support among working, hardworking Americans, white Americans, is weakening again, and how whites in both states who had not completed college were supporting me."

"There's a pattern emerging here," she said.

Obama's campaign did not respond to the comments, which generated buzz in the liberal blogosphere.

Working-class whites overwhelmingly favor Clinton over Obama, and their view of the Illinois senator has grown increasingly negative since late last year, according to Associated Press-Yahoo News polling. In an AP-Yahoo survey a month ago, more than half - or 53 percent - of whites who have not finished college had negative impressions of Obama, up a 12 points since November.

Data from exit polls also show that Obama's problem with working-class whites persists. About six in 10 of them voted for Clinton in primaries on Super Tuesday (Feb. 5) and earlier, and they have leaned toward her slightly more since then. On Tuesday, Clinton was supported by 65 percent of whites who have not finished college in Indiana and 71 percent of them in North Carolina.

With virtually no chance of catching Obama in the popular vote or among pledged delegates, Clinton and her strategists have pinned their hope on persuading superdelegates - elected officials and party activists - that she would be the stronger Democrat to run against McCain.

Harold Ickes, who heads the Clinton campaign's outreach to superdelegates, has acknowledged discussing Obama's controversial former pastor, Jeremiah Wright, with superdelegates, saying Wright's incendiary anti-American sermons and other comments could alienate voters in the fall.

At a rally under the dome of the West Virginia Capitol, Clinton dismissed calls for her to drop out as "deja vu all over again." She said she had faced similar pressure before going on to win primaries in New Hampshire, Ohio, Texas and Pennsylvania.

She made her case for pressing on, and thanked her supporters for doing the same.

"A lot of you have stuck with me. You've been through all the ups and downs in this campaign, the biggest victories and toughest moments," Clinton said. "I think it is because you understand that you've got to have a president who gets up every day and fights for you, who never gives up on you."

Her fading chances didn't diminish the loyalty of Evelyn Smith, 78, one of hundreds of supporters who jammed into the Capitol and waited nearly two hours to hear Clinton speak.

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