By Matt Snyder
MERCER COUNTY — The already historic battle between Sens. Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton continues here on Tuesday and, for the first time in a long time, Pennsylvania may play a role in selecting a presidential nominee.
It won’t play the pivotal role. Delegate math makes it impossible for either candidate to secure the Democratic nomination by winning the Keystone State.
Obama holds the lead in delegates and the popular vote, but no matter how the remaining primaries go, he can’t secure the 2,025 delegates needed to win the party’s nod.
Clinton has gone from front-runner to second banana but she’s still holding the lead in Pennsylvania polls. She is hoping to perform well enough in the home stretch that she can convince superdelegates she’s got momentum, staying power and the expertise to defeat Republican Sen. John McCain.
It’s an exciting time to be a Democratic primary voter. So exciting that since January, 734 of Mercer County’s registered voters — whether Republican, Independent or minor party — have switched parties to get in on the primary action.
With the new registrations, county Democrats outnumber Republicans by 7,420 voters. That’s more than 10 percent of the county’s primary-voting electorate.
While there’s also a four-way race for the 3rd Congressional District nomination, the presidential contest is clearly the main event and Director of Elections Jeff Greenburg is predicting 50 percent county-wide turnout for the primary.
“We expect to break a record as far as primaries go in Mercer County this year,” he said. “Clearly, we are going to surpass what we have seen in the last three presidential primaries.”
He expected turnout as high as 60 or 70 percent in the Shenango Valley and other Democrat-heavy precincts.
In Republican areas, it will likely be about 30 to 40 percent. “That will still be a lot more than what we’ve seen in the last presidential primaries,” Greenburg said.
Because that could mean 35,000 people voting on Tuesday, voters should allow themselves plenty of time if they intend to vote either right before or after normal work hours, especially in the Shenango Valley, Greenburg said.
Both Clinton and Obama have opened local campaign offices and support for the candidates is clear from the signs peppering roadsides from Stoneboro to the Shenango Valley. Oddly enough, they’re almost matched in some places by placards for Republican Ron Paul, who suspended his campaign after McCain secured the nomination.
Local Democrats have seen a few political near-celebrities make appearances here for Mrs. Clinton and Obama and partisans on both sides of the campaign were expected to turn out Saturday for a rally featuring Bill Clinton campaigning for his wife.
Demographically speaking, Mercer County’s Democrats should break for Mrs. Clinton. They’re older. They’re female and they come from the blue-collar tradition.
Sharon Mayor Bob Lucas spoke at the opening of her office in Sharon and is representing the campaign at some events.
According to Kathie Petrovich, a 74-year-old Sharon woman who supports Mrs. Clinton, “I think Hillary knows all the ins and outs. I think Obama is way too young.”
Retired steelworker Barb Brucker, 60, said Mrs. Clinton already has White House experience because of her almost certain input as First Lady.
“She’s a fighting candidate and she doesn’t back down,” Ms. Brucker added.
But there’s a strong strain for Obama here, too. Weekly meetings of his supporters overwhelmed the capacity of Panera Bread by the time of the Ohio primary and they had to move to Chestnut Street Cafe, Sharon.
County Controller Tom Amundsen was handing out Obama literature recently. “I think the nation needs a change,” Amundsen said. “His whole candidacy is about hope and change.”
Farrell Area School Board member Sadie Benham said she’s fired up and backing Obama. “I haven’t been this excited since Kennedy,” she said.
Fellow school board member Lester Robinson agreed. He said both Democrats are good candidates, but he’s hopped ship from Mrs. Clinton to Obama.
“In my lifetime, I’m seeing a black guy doing it. I didn’t think I would,” Robinson said.
Ms. Benham said it’s a historic and emotional moment for her, but largely because of Obama’s ability to bring people together – rich and poor, black and white, young and old.
Tom Rookey, former Mercer County elections director and registered Democrat, said of the tight presidential primary, “I feel like what we’re watching is two different kinds of political machines slugging it out.”
He said the race is starting to get uglier as it wears on.
Mrs. Clinton has taken shots at the Obama campaign by suggesting his relationship with the controversial Rev. Jeremiah Wright is fair game and pouncing on comments made April 6 about small town Pennsylvanians clinging to guns and religion because of bitterness over bad economic breaks.
And Obama has in turn hammered Mrs. Clinton on NAFTA and the Colombian trade deal. Mrs. Clinton has criticized the trade agreements, even though NAFTA was passed by her husband, and he still supports the Columbian deal.
“Personally, I am concerned it’s going to continue so that when we get to the general election, so much mud will have flown through the air it’s going to have a residual effect,” Rookey said.
He also said that personality and style will matter less in the November election, when people will start really feeling the sting of lost jobs, homes and a stumbling economy, plus a war that Americans are increasingly viewing as a money pit.
