I thought she was going to do that when her campaign froze in place after the Wright speeches and Obama's Philly speech. They thought the best bet was to sit still and let this happen without them. Maybe that was the plan for five minutes. Until it didn't look like it was going to deliver the death blow, so she had to bludgeon bludgeon bludgeon, being a fighter and all. I can't see her sitting on her hands now.

Psantillana: Surely you will prove to be correct. Hillary went negative in a big way when she fell behind earlier in the primary season and I don't see her mellowing out now. That means one more month of hostile fire and then we shall see if she withdraws when Howie Dean et. al. call for her to do so.

She can still do a lot of damage and boost her case for 2012. She stands to win sweeping victories in West Virginia and Kentucky that will make her look like the populist, swing state winner that she has been selling herself as. Maybe she goes out after that; it's hard to imagine her walking away from those sure-fire wins.

Now is the moment we discover whether, along with the obvious "fighter" in Hillary Clinton, there is also a stateswoman.  She gave it her all - more than I think was appropriate, on the negative side at least - and came up short.  If she goes out gracefully, campaigning against McCain and for the Democratic party, I'll be happy to see her as the prodigal daughter, and welcome her back.  Obama can offer her anything she wants in his cabinet, and I'll be happy.  But if she continues to flail around for personal advantage in a lost cause, she belongs in the dustbin of Democratic Party history.

Must be something in the water in Little Rock.

It may actually be in Obama's best interest to have Hillary in it (most of the way) through June 3, provided she runs a more positive, less attack-driven campaign.  When Clinton drops out, it's going to take a little bit for many of her supporters to get behind Obama, and some of them might never do so.  If she drops out now, there are a bunch of primaries left--some of which, like West Virginia and Kentucky, are very favorable to Clinton--in which her supporters can still vote for her and conceivably hand her wins.  It would be a pretty bad bunch of headlines if Obama lost to (or just narrowly beat) a candidate no longer in the race.  In comparing Clinton and Huckabee, there's a crucial difference at this point: Clinton can still win some primaries.

But, but .. I kind of liked Huckabee. Seems a decent guy, and the crazy stuff he believes has nothing to do with the president's actual job. Hillary, not so much on either count.

Anyone notice how Hillary dissed Oregon last night, mentioning only WV and Kentucky. I bet you the people in Oregon did and she just lopped off five points there, I bet Obama wins Oregon now bigger than Hillary wins Kentucky.

Rhub, yeah I really like the Huckster too, and McCain owes him hugely for taking Iowa away from Romney, and simply acting like a stalking horse making sure McCain had a reason to make a speech, it would have even been better if it kept going for longer for McCain. And Huckabee has publicly sided with Obama over the Wright mess as well. The guy is a stand up guy, the anti-thesis of Hillary.

The pundits are either outright declaring Obama the nominee (Tim Russert, Matt Drudge) or speculating on when her campaign will end. But what's the range of opinion out there?

Yesterday, Dick Morris wrote this in The Hill , dismissing the idea that Hillary would adopt the Mike