Clinton Sheds Staff Amid Signs Of Wind Down — Almost (UPDATED)

Is Democratic Senator Hillary Clinton now winding down her campaign with the shedding of staff as a key indicator? Or is is this merely a sign that the primary season is over and now she moves it to a new phase — kind of a political guerrilla warfare phase to pick off superdelegates or get ready in case some new rumored bombshell about front runner Senator Barack Obama surfaces?

There are conflicting reports right now: reports that suggest the campaign may be winding down and in its last viable moments and reports suggesting that Clinton is considering battling on no matter what anyone — including some wavering supporters — may wish.

The story that’s making the biggest buzz is via The Politico:

Members of Hillary Clinton’s advance staff received calls and emails this evening from headquarters summoning them to New York City Tuesday night, and telling them their roles on the campaign are ending, two Clinton staffers tell my colleague Amie Parnes.

The advance staffers — most of them now in Puerto Rico, South Dakota, and Montana — are being given the options of going to New York for a final day Tuesday, or going home, the aides said. The move is a sign that the campaign is beginning to shed — at least — some of its staff. The advance staff is responsible for arranging the candidate’s events around the country.

And how did the Clinton campaign respond? This way:

Clinton’s senior aides didn’t respond to requests for comment on her Tuesday night plans.

That usually means a source is trying to find the best way to respond to a report so they can put unhelpful news in a better light, or find a response that would help sandbag the story….or that they hope the reporter will simply go away so the story won’t grow anymore.. If something is false, they usually very respond quickly.

But Clinton isn’t out (yet). She made it clear to reporters on her campaign plan that she intends to go after Obama superdelegates, noting that they could change their minds.

One tidbit of this assertion is the context — it comes amid a pro-Clinton website’s repeated assertions that there is a new video damaging to Obama involving his wife talking at their ex church. And since it was on a website that got lots of hits, the alleged tape became a discussion point on a cable network.

But, even if it proved correct — and reporters will rightfully want to trace the sourcing of this (who got the tape, who leaked it, who was pushing it, what political camps wanted it out there and why…and the timing of the release and why) — 1) it would have to be something hugely earth-shattering to derail Obama’s bandwagon and (2) if the tape could be interpreted in several ways, it may not have the impact Obama foes assumed it would (3) there are some voters who would be so revolted by yet more search-and-destroy 20th century style politics that those touting it would lose their votes come November.

UPDATE: It’s worth inserting this comment from Ann Althouse, who does a post on a network discussing talk about this video:

Republican dirty tricks or Clintonian dirty tricks? What we have is not a video, but a rumor of a video. The rumor helps Hillary right now.

UPDATE II: There is now some..ahem…skepticism in the blogosphere over this tape.

Clinton’s dilemma is that although she won the Puerto Rico primary by a whopping margin yesterday, the impact of that win is minimal in terms of the news media — which is already minimizing the win’s impact on a campaign most feel is all but over.

And the Los Angeles Times says Clinton could start losing supporters:

Pointing the way to a peaceful end for the tumultuous presidential primary campaign, some key supporters of Hillary Rodham Clinton said Sunday that they accepted a new finish line in the race for delegates, a threshold Barack Obama could reach as soon as this week.

Obama aides said they expected him to surpass the 2,118 needed delegates after the final Democratic balloting finished Tuesday in South Dakota and Montana, and as more superdelegates backed the Illinois senator.

Moreover, a number of Clinton backers signaled Sunday that they were wary of the kind of protracted fight that some of her aides said they might wage in the coming months.

“It would be most beneficial if we resolved this nomination sooner rather than later,” said U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz of Florida, a high-profile superdelegate who backs Clinton. “The more time we have to get through a general-election period and the more time we have to prepare in advance of the convention, the better.”

But Clinton has now indicated she could decided to challenge the new “magic number” of delegates needed to win nomination. Via ABC’s Jake Trapper:

“That’s a question we’re going to be considering,” Clinton said. “Because obviously I still believe, I was pleased that the electoral results of the primaries were accepted that was the basis for the decisions that were made which is something I’ve been arguing for months as you know. And I was also pleased that Florida was fully seated but the half vote penalty I think is unwarranted under the circumstances and I thought Michigan was in violation of the rules so we’re going to decide how to proceed and depending upon what the outcome of that decision is we will either mount a challenge or not but obviously it would have an impact on the number of delegates necessary to pledge the nomination.”

All of which is to say – Sen. Barack Obama, D-Illinois, may reach 2,118 this week, but Clinton may assert that doesn’t mean anything.

Fasten your seat-belts.

The New York Times paints a portrait of a candidate whose own supporters may be getting weary but she’s ready to fight on, despite all of the widely publicized talk about the need for party unity going into the general election:

Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton won another overwhelming victory over Senator Barack Obama on Sunday — this time in Puerto Rico — even as many Democrats, including some of her supporters, suggested it would be best if she dropped her threat to battle on past the end of the primary voting on Tuesday.

“There’s nobody taking Hillary’s side but Hillary people,” said Donald Fowler of South Carolina, a former national party chairman and one of Mrs. Clinton’s most prominent supporters, referring to her campaign’s suggestions that she might seek to challenge the way the party resolved the fight this weekend over seating the Michigan and Florida delegations. “It’s too bad. She deserves better than this.”

In a telephone interview Sunday from San Juan, P.R., Mrs. Clinton still raised the possibility that she would challenge the party’s decision on seating those delegates. “Well, we are going to look at that and make a determination at some point,” she said. “But I haven’t made any decision at this time.”

Barring some truly earth-shattering development, the math for Clinton simply doesn’t look good. The Houston Chronicle blog:

On the delegate count, Obama is now within approximately 50 of securing the nomination. Hillary needs to win about 90% of the remaining superdelegates to get the victory. Again, you can probably count on one hand the number of people who think this is possible.

Donna Brazile gave a hint yesterday on This Week at what she expects to see in the next few days. The remaining supers will begin to move after the last primary on Tuesday and pull the plug on the Clinton life-support machine. Brazile has been uncommitted up to this point, but yesterday her words were “it’s over.” I suspect if an influential Democrat like Brazile has this sentiment she is not alone.

An assumption in many of the articles in the mainstream media and weblogs is that if Clinton battles on and the party remains angrily divided and loses, she can then pick up the pieces for 2012. But if the Democrats lose this year and the finger is pointed at Clinton going to the mat after most analysts say the mat has been filled and completed, it’s likely she’ll have a built in contingent of Democrats who will be looking for the Anybody But Hillary candidate in 2012.

If the Michelle Obama “whitey” tape does come out today and fingers are pointed at the Clinton camp (two primaries are tomorrow so to say the timing would suspect would be an understatement), look for Clinton to perhaps permanently lose one segment of the Democratic party that will battle her tooth and nail in 2012 — and perhaps even back a primary challenge to her when she’s up for re-election in New York.

On the other hand, one thread going through many newspaper reports is a section where they quote someone close to her saying she is a realist. And that has indeed been a key characteristic of both Clintons.

So it’s more likely than not that if Obama wins the two remaining primaries tomorrow and gets enough superdelegates to put him over the top, Clinton will start to curtail her campaign on a large scale — perhaps continue enough of it to please hard-core backers but essentially end it.

UPDATE III: MSNBC’s required-reading First Thoughts has this take on Clinton’s end game:

Given those odds, how does she end this thing? While there are plenty of hints today from some of her top supporters (like Ed Rendell and Debbie Wasserman Schultz) that Clinton won’t take this to the convention, it’s also clear that she and her campaign aren’t leaving without a fight. Examples: 1) Harold Ickes declaring that Clinton reserves her right to take that fight to the convention over four Michigan delegates; 2) the campaign implicitly linking Obama with George McGovern by stating that the last time the Democrats didn’t give the nomination to the candidate who won the most votes was in 1972; 3) Clinton demonstrating that superdelegates can change their mind by introducing one such super who has switched from Clinton to Obama and then back to Clinton; and 4) her victory speech yesterday from Puerto Rico, in which she said in the end: “Let’s keep fighting. Let’s keep fighting. Let’s keep fighting. Let’s keep fighting.” Clinton certainly has the opportunity to make bygones be bygones — as well as quell the resentment brewing among some of her ardent female supporters — but when does she do this? And what does she say? For yet another hint at what Clinton’s week is going to look like, Terry McAuliffe announced on Morning Joe that Clinton will be giving her Tuesday night victory speech in her elective office home state: New York.