If this happens than Hillary will NOT win the general election over McCain because the African-American vote is crucial for the Dem nominee in many of these swing states ie Pennsylvania, Missouri, Ohio, etc.

The bottom line is this:  Whom ever wins the Dem primary has to look like he or she won it BEFORE the superdelegates swing towards that candidate.  If either candidate looks like he or she won just because of the superdelegates when the other person had more pledged delegates, this party is going to be DIVIDED.

1. What issue(s) will dominate in November:

• foregin policy (Iraq), or
  
• economy ("food on the table")

• character and judement
  
• ability to deliver

Obama would have no problem with hispanic voters, IMO, if any of the Republicans other than McCain were the nominee.   The rest tanked themselves with their anti-immigrant rhetoric.  McCain, OTOH, was one of the primary backers of the most recent immigration reform bill and he did so, even though he knew it would hurt him - and did hurt him - politically with his base.  Now, sure, he backed off of it in the end and has sucked up to the base during the primary, but I think some hispanic voters will still give him credit for it.  Maybe not a majority, but possibly enough to hurt Obama in some states, like Florida, Nevada and New Mexico (the latter two of which border McCain's home state).

Older voters have consistently reported "expierence" as their reason for supporting Clinton over Obama.  Now, many of them will probably stick with Obama, but I think there will be some who would choose McCain simply because they are comfortable with him as Commander-in-Chief.  One of the big breaks that Obama has gotten in the Democratic primary is that the standards normally applied to candidates' "readiness" to be CinC have been essentially ignored, part of that is that it's the democratic primary and part of it, I think, is that his opponent is a woman.  Even then, Obama tends to lose people to Clinton if they decided on election day, this is common and usually happens for the less known candidate.

Maybe it's me, but I can see some older voters going into the booth and deciding that, while they may like Obama, they just feel safer with the guy they know, McCain, even if they don't like his policies as much.  

There is no mathematical formula for how they should vote. Change the rules for the next election if it seems unfair.

Look, Democrats and most independents voting in Democratic primaries are going to vote Democratic in 2008. Moreover, this year gives any Democrat enormous structural advantages over any Republican candidate, no matter what the match-up. Just wait until we are officially in a recession, unemployment ticks up to 6%, and gas prices stay high through the year. Given Bush's approval, voter identification, right track/wrong track patters, and the enthusiasm gap, any Democrat can and will win. While most polling suggests that Obama is the stronger general election candidate (and he's the one Republicans are most afraid of), Hillary can also win quite handily.

Clinton/Obama I can see but Obama/Clinton is much more problematic.  There seems to have been much more nastiness in that direction and I think it could get in the way.

As for the main thrust of your article, it seems like you are picking and choosing trends to suit your own perception of the primary contests.  At one point, you suggest that momentum and trends are empty buzzwords, but your argument seems to rest entirely on the particular trends you consider to be massively important.  I think that you are overstating the demographic leanings of voters.  There are demographic trends, of course -- one cannot deny it.  But "Latino" and "white" and "working class" mean different things from state to state and perhaps even more from district to district.  I worry about the desire to group people together as voting blocks, especially on racial, economic and gender lines.  Of course it is valid and often useful, but it's problematic and can even be misleading.

HRC would have vy limited choices in assuaging any lingering resentment about the primary contest by picking an AA -- the list would be quite short.  Obama might be necessary in that scenario.  Since he's younger and less experienced in DC, the #2 job isn't that far fetched and would groom him for 2016 (assuming our planet somehow miraculously escapes the upcoming, feared Mayan end date of 12-21-12 ...)

Obama, if he wins the nom, can bring disgruntled women for Hillary back on board by choosing from among probably a handful of solid women pols, either gov's or senators.  Sibelius is possible, Blanche Lincoln too, or Stabenow or one of the WA senators.  Much might depend on whether the state has a Repub or Dem  gov.  We can't afford to be losing even one Dem senator to the R side.

"Some of the comments he has made recently won't help him in that area at all. In fact, he is rapidly getting to the point that a lot of women won't even vote for him in the general, were he to get that far."

Really? Name even one such "comment" and/or one such "fact", please. Provide your links/references too please. Go ahead, educate me.

Billary supporters, as a reflection of the candidate herself, make it easy to oppose her nomination efforts. Like BushCo and his supporters, when they engage in some negative behavior, they immediately turn around and accuse their political opponents of the sin they themselves are guilty of: sexism, lying, making claims they can't back with FACTS, etc, etc, etc.

It's funny; the author of this original post says:

"That is some understatement. He has lost white women, Latinos, and working class white men in almost every primary. Take California for instance."

The funny part is that the premise of the post is about how others [Matt Stoller]

" ... allows the important underlying story to be overshadowed"

Meanwhile, Big Tent Democrat seemingly choses to ignore the most important 'underlying' story: Obama is currently the leading candidate for the nomination, and that is no accident ... the majority of WE THE PEOPLE have voted for Obama over Clinton to-date. THAT is the only story that matters so far. It also means that Obama is being voted for by MORE than a single demographic. So, GET OVER IT.

Hillary Clinton is a Republicrat.