Clinton goes after Obama's strengths

INDIANAPOLIS -- Fresh off her big win in Pennsylvania, Hillary Rodham Clinton is attempting to rewrite the presidential campaign narrative using a new two-pronged argument that goes after Barack Obama's strengths.

The new Clinton strategy: Claim -- somewhat implausibly -- that she has received more popular votes than Obama while also boasting of her campaign's newfound fundraising strength. The Clinton campaign claims to have brought in $10 million through its website in the 17 hours after the New York senator won Pennsylvania.

The two talking points -- pushed by campaign aides to reporters in conference calls, impromptu gaggles on her campaign plane and by Clinton herself in a round of network interviews, a morning speech in Indianapolis and a call with donors -- are intended primarily for the consumption of the superdelegates who will decide the nomination.

The argument is geared to undercut two of the main premises of Obama's case about why he would be a more viable general election candidate against the presumptive Republican nominee, Arizona Sen. John McCain.

Obama often points out that he has won more states, pledged delegates and votes in nominating events sanctioned by the Democratic Party.

And Obama's backers point to his record-shattering fundraising -- at the end of March, he'd raised $236 million for his campaign, compared to $195 million for Clinton and $72 million for McCain -- as evidence that he will be able to run a more formidable general election campaign.

Clinton's claims about her popular vote lead are based on tallies kept by Real Clear Politics and other media that include the votes cast in the Democratic primaries in Michigan (where Obama wasn't even on the ballot) and Florida.

The Democratic National Committee does not intend to do that, as it now stands, since the states held their primaries earlier than the party wanted. But post-Pennsylvania, Clinton and her backers are stepping up their calls for an agreement that would allow delegates from the two states to be seated at the national convention.

The Clinton campaign included top backers from Florida and Michigan -- Sen. Bill Nelson of Florida and Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm -- on its Wednesday conference call to make the case.

And Clinton herself used a midday speech in Indiana -- which, along with North Carolina, votes May 6 -- to make the case.

"It's a very close race, but if you count -- as I count -- the 2.3 million people who voted in Michigan and Florida, then we are going to build on that," Clinton told a crowd gathered under a hot sun in an Indianapolis park. "We just have to get the Democratic party to give them the delegates that reflect their votes, but we'll be working on that."

Still, she said: "I'm very proud that, as of today, I have received more votes by the people who have voted than anybody else." And she urged the crowd, which numbered in the hundreds, to contribute to her campaign, adding that Obama outspent her in Pennsylvania by as much as 3.5 to 1.

"It's a tremendous challenge to get the message out when you're being outspent in that way," she said, also calling on Obama to agree to debate her in Indiana.

After the rally, she told donors on a conference call: "We've been just runnin' on fumes."

She told the donors she, her husband and daughter had already made a combined 50 visits to Indiana, where she's thought to stand a better chance than in North Carolina.

"What we can't match with media, we match with shoe leather," she said. "We will keep doing that, but we've got to have the resources to keep our campaign winning."

Her finance director, Jonathan Mantz, told the same donors that between 10 p.m. Tuesday and 2:35 p.m. Wednesday, the campaign brought in $10 million, including contributions from 60,000 new donors.

"It is unbelievable what's going on right now," he said, detailing 17 fundraisers planned for the next month from Portland, Ore., to Detroit and Greensboro, N.C.

He urged donors who haven't contributed the maximum $2,300 to the campaign to do so before the Federal Election Commission reporting period closes at the end of April. And Mantz urged those who had maxed out to recruit one other maximum donor before May.

"If we can do that," he said, "we're going to have enough resources to get our message out, to raise the millions necessary to be on par with Sen. Obama and do whatever it takes to be successful."