Hillary's campaign is helping one person: John McCain.

This has always been my problem with Hillary Clinton's campaign. It requires Barack Obama to either self destruct or be brought to his knees by the campaign of his democratic rival.

And, with the controversial comments made by Reverend Wright saturating the American airwaves, there was only ever going to be one winner, and that is John McCain.

The infighting among Democrats and the recent negative tone of their campaign has meanwhile benefited the Republicans, with a Reuters/Zogby poll showing John McCain leading Mrs Clinton by three (a statistical tie) and Mr Obama by six points.

The reason that all this is happening is because Hillary can't win the delegate count and seeks to gain victory by proving to the super delegates that Obama is somehow unfit for the candidacy. It's nothing less than a blatant attempt to disenfranchise the voters and usurp the will of the electorate. Quite how Democrats like Taylor Marsh can support this policy is simply beyond me.

She positively relishes in crap like this:

Meanwhile, the superdelegates are watching all this play out, with Wright's greatest hatred hits on YouTube sending a chill down their collective spine.

And she does so whilst admitting that "the maths" - what the rest of us would refer to as "the rules" - are heavily pointing towards an Obama victory.

How are Democrats like Marsh ever going to be able to unite behind Obama, should he be the victor, when they have spent so many months spewing venom towards him? I have always said that I would welcome a Clinton presidency, my problem with Hillary in recent weeks is that she appears to be seeking to usurp the democratic process and gain the nomination even if the electorate have made it perfectly clear that she is not their choice.

I find it simply stunning that any Democrat - for any reason - can back her as she attempts to do this.

Mrs Clinton's campaign is also hamstrung by her defeats last month. Senior Democrats say her ability to snatch the nomination from Mr Obama now depends on her winning the overall popular vote when the contests end in June, thereby raising enough questions about his electability to persuade the superdelegates to come to her side. Yesterday, Mr Obama appeared confident that, by that time, he would still hold the lead in the popular vote, as well as delegates from the state contests. He backed a suggestion that the superdelegates then hold a meeting to decide which candidate to back, ensuring the bickering does not go all the way to the August convention.

Mr Obama now leads by 700,000 votes out of 26 million cast and 12 million people have a voice in the remaining primaries and caucuses. Mr Obama accepts there is nothing to stop a tenacious Mrs Clinton taking her battle all the way to the floor of the Denver convention on 25 August – in the hope that his campaign will implode along the way – but that will leave little time for the winning candidate to organise and fight the presidential election in November.

And therein lies the rub. Hillary can take this all the way to Denver in the hope that the Obama camp will implode somewhere along the way, but the damage that she is doing to the chances of the party gaining the presidency is simply enormous.

Once again, Hillary shows us that her personal ambition matters more to her than a Democratic victory in November.

I cannot be alone in finding that simply repulsive.

UPDATE:

And whilst Hillary and others seek to make a great deal about Obama's relationship with Reverend Wright, this picture will perhaps give them room for pause. He's not quite as marginal a figure as Hillary's supporters would like us to believe.

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Tags: Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, US election 2008, Democratic presidential nominee, Reverend Wright, John McCain