Obama reshapes campaign to focus on presidential contest

BARACK OBAMA is reshaping his campaign to focus on November's presidential election, visiting battleground states and seeking to unite the Democratic party after declaring himself "within reach" of the presidential nomination.

Mr Obama won a solid victory in Oregon on Tuesday but he lost to Hillary Clinton by a landslide in Kentucky the same day. At a victory celebration in Iowa, where his caucus win in January put him on the road to the nomination, Mr Obama said he had won a majority of elected delegates.

"Last night, I was in Iowa because we marked a significant moment in our campaign where we achieved a majority of the pledged delegates that are assigned in this election. And so we are at the threshold of being able to attain this nomination," Mr Obama told an audience in Tampa, Florida, yesterday.

The three remaining primaries - in Puerto Rico on June 1st and in Montana and South Dakota two days later - offer a combined total of 86 delegates and only 210 super- delegates remain undeclared.

Mr Obama's campaign said yesterday that he needed only 62 more delegates to win the overall majority needed to secure the nomination but Mrs Clinton insisted that the race would not end until disputed primaries in Michigan and Florida were recognised.

The Democratic National Committee will decide at the end of next week how to resolve the dispute over the two states, which were stripped of all their delegates because they scheduled primaries too early. No Democrats campaigned in either state and Mr Obama's name was not on the ballot in Michigan

Mrs Clinton, who won both primaries, wants all their delegates to be recognised. "If you can discern the clear intent of the voter, why would you punish the voter? We are turning this into a major battle that I think is really ill-serving the party," she said yesterday.

Mrs Clinton won Kentucky by 65 per cent to Mr Obama's 30 per cent, winning a majority of every demographic group, but the Illinois senator is so confident of winning the nomination that he lavished praise on his rival during Tuesday's victory speech.

"We have had our disagreements during this campaign, but we all admire her courage, her commitment and her perseverance," Mr Obama said.

"No matter how this primary ends, Senator Clinton has shattered myths and broken barriers and changed the America in which my daughters and yours will come of age."

Mr Obama's team is acutely aware of the raw feelings in the Clinton camp, particularly among women, many of whom believe that sexism and misogyny helped to wreck their hopes of electing the first woman US president.