Almost Heaven

Almost heaven West Virginia, Blue Ridge Mountains Shenandoah River. So sang folk artist John Denver 35 years ago, and so the pretty but poor Appalachian state will seem to Hillary Clinton on Tuesday. She will roll up an enormous win there, but it comes too late to do her flagging campaign much good.

The Mountaineer State has a demographic profile that plays right into Hillary's wheelhouse this election cycle. It's almost all white, downscale, has relatively few college graduates and is older than average. Grand slam. Sen. Clinton could well romp to a 70-30 landslide that could net her 20 of West Virgnia's covey of 28 delegates.

What's of greater concern to the Democratic Party is that her strength in the state would give her an excellent chance to win it and its 5 electoral votes against John McCain in November. West Virginia used to be a reliably Democratic state, but that changed this decade as its social conservatism overcame its miner's union past and George W. Bush beat both Al Gore and John Kerry. Polls have Clinton running ahead of McCain in a state tossup but show Obama hopelessly behind.

That is the kind of argument Clinton is still trying to make to superdelegates, that she is more competitive against the Republicans in several states, particularly in the Ohio River Valley area. She probably is. But Obama makes the counterargument that he will win Pennsylvania anyway and will make up for West Virginia and possibly Ohio with wins in places where she is less likely to prevail--places like Oregon, Iowa and Colorado.

The argument is largely moot at this point in any case, Obama having at this point all but a lock on the nomination. The key for Obama and the Party is whether Hillary will ease the situation by strongly endorsing and campaigning for him in such areas and among hispanics and women in the months ahead. My reckoning is that she will. For Obama in these parts, that would be almost heaven.