Both Obama and Clinton prepare to claim victories

U.S. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton stirred an electric capacity crowd at Transylvania University on the eve of Kentucky's long-awaited presidential primary, even as her opponent -- U.S. Sen. Barack Obama -- prepared to achieve a key milestone Tuesday.

While it's unlikely Obama can snare the magic number of 2,026 total Democratic National Convention votes to secure the nomination Tuesday, he's almost assured to get a majority of the 3,253 pledged delegates -- those who are automatically assigned to support a candidate based on the results of states' primaries and caucuses.

Obama needs just 14 more to pass that mark with 103 pledged delegates at stake in Oregon and Kentucky, which both vote Tuesday.

"When the votes are counted in Oregon and Kentucky, we could secure a majority of delegates elected by the voters," Obama's campaign manager David Plouffe said Monday in a memo to supporters. "A clear majority of elected delegates will send an unmistakable message: The people have spoken, and they are ready for change."

Obama will campaign Tuesday in Iowa, the state that gave him his first win five months ago. But Clinton's campaign warned him not to claim the nomination there.

"Declaring mission accomplished does not make it so," Clinton's communications director Howard Wolfson wrote in a memo.

Clinton and her husband, former President Bill Clinton, gave no signs that they plan to concede to Obama as they barnstormed Kentucky on Monday.

"The last thing we need is someone who gives up and quits as our next president," Hillary Clinton said. "This country is worth fighting for."

Her husband ripped pundits who keep speculating about her political demise.

"They've declared her dead more times than a cat's got lives," he said, prompting an avalanche of "No's" from a fired-up crowd of 1,500 in Lexington. "I believe it is far more likely than not, that when this is over, she will have won the majority of votes in all states despite being outspent by $60 million."

Clinton's campaign has long made the argument that a big margin of victory in Kentucky can slice into Obama's 600,000-vote lead or give Clinton the lead, depending on whether votes from Florida and Michigan count.

Those two states complicated the Democratic Party's already cryptic delegate calculus when they broke party rules by holding their primaries too early. The party stripped them of their delegates and Obama's name wasn't even on Michigan's ballot.

Clinton and Obama are scheduled to campaign in Florida on Wednesday.

In the meantime, Clinton supporters are banking on leaving Kentucky with a cushion of 100,000 to 250,000 more votes than Obama, depending on turnout.

"We need to send Hillary Clinton out of Kentucky with the biggest majority that any state has done," said Jerry Lundergan, Clinton's Kentucky campaign chairman at Monday night's rally.

She leads Obama by 27 points in last week's Herald-Leader/WKYT Kentucky Poll.

But Obama leads Clinton in overall delegates with 1,915 and in pledged delegates -- 1,613.5 to 1,443.5 -- after securing three more last weekend, according to a campaign memo. One was re-allocated from Nevada's caucuses and two switched after being pledged to former presidential candidate John Edwards, who endorsed Obama last week.

Obama's wife, Michelle Obama, told 250 volunteers at the campaign's Lexington office Monday night that her husband's time is near.

"We're right on the precipice of something phenomenal," she said. "It's right there, right within our grasp: the new America. The America we are building for our future."

Obama didn't mention Clinton or presumptive Republican nominee John McCain in her 23-minute speech. Still, she did look beyond the primaries.

"After this, it will get harder," she said, a clear reference to increasingly sharp rhetoric Republicans have aimed at her husband in recent days. "We're already getting a taste of what's in store."

Clinton, in her speech across town, said she has the experience to start on "Day One" and jump-start the economy with a focus on clean, renewable energy.

"The president will walk in to the Oval Office and all the cameras will be gone, the lights will be down, the speeches will be over," she said during a 31-minute speech. "It is that person who will have to begin to make the best decisions for you, and your families and our country and the world. That is what I'm prepared to do."

Bill Clinton said daughter Chelsea was recently asked which of her parents would be the better president. She picked her mother.

Bill Clinton said his daughter didn't back off when he asked her about it later: "She said, 'Dad, they asked me a direct question, I had to give an honest answer.'"

Herald-Leader staff writer Steve Lannen contributed to this report.