President Barack Obama continued his largely unopposed sweep of the Democratic presidential nomination process Tuesday with victories in Arkansas and Kentucky.
But some Washington insiders have suggested that Obama's relatively small margin of victory in Arkansas over challenger John Wolfe, a Tennessee lawyer who was also on the ballot in three other states, shows signs of Democratic dissatisfaction with the President.
To be sure, Obama's margin of victory, 58 percent to Wolfe's 42, would be considered almost a blowout in any hotly contested primary election.
However, with Obama's advantage as an incumbent President and the almost complete lack of resources and name recognition that Wolfe had to overcome, some in Washington point to the relatively narrow margin as a sign of unhappiness with Obama among conservative Democrats.
To bolster that point, pundits also cite the 42 percent of Democratic primary voters in Kentucky who voted for "uncommitted" over Obama, along with the 41 percent of the West Virginia primary vote carried by Keith Judd - a perennial candidate presently serving a sentence in federal prison for extortion.
And while there is likely some dissatisfaction among conservative Democrats with Obama's policies, which the President's critics have often painted as far left, other Democrats have consistently faulted Obama for not being liberal enough.
Furthermore, the margins are likely somewhat inflated given the expectedly low turnout in 2012 Democratic primaries and caucuses given that Obama faces no serious opposition (with apologies to Wolfe, Judd, Florida blogger Darcy Richardson, Jim Rodgers of Oklahoma and Vermin Supreme of Massachusetts who is perhaps best known for wearing a boot on his head).
So should Obama's reelection campaign worry about the specter of the big bad Wolfe, who is also on the ballot in Texas next week, or the any of the others?
Hardly.
Not only has none of the other candidates won a single delegate for the Democratic National Convention, but Obama actually clinched the nomination more than a month and a half ago on April 3rd.
by RTT Staff Writer
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