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Last call for Hillary?

    by Will Bunch | Columnist
    Published 
"She loves to sit, throw 'em back. So to me this is nothin' new. We all hear about the story that she and John McCain actually had a shot contest, I think in the Ukraine or somewhere around the world. And she actually beat John McCain in a shot contest. She's a girl from Illinois who likes to throw 'em down with the rest of us."
-- Clinton advisor Terry McAuliffe, speaking on MSNBC earlier today.

Hillary Clinton may be putting those skills to use as I write this -- because she's had a long night. The results from North Carolina and Indiana aren't final yet, and there's a slim outside chance that late results from Gary, Ind., will give Barack Obama a two-fer. But even if she hangs on by her fingernails there, tonight definitely amounted to a last call for Hillary Clinton. They haven't herded her out the door and into the dark political night just yet, but it's getting past time for the bartender to call the cab company.

She can't win -- not in pledged delegates for sure and probably not in popular votes, not with a 14-point loss in the Tarheel State. The pundits, for what it's worth, are on that bandwagon, and the candidates seem to realize that as well. There was a noticable change of tone in the candidate's speeches -- more conciliatory, more looking ahead to November. The only question is whether she sticks around for expected wins in Appalachia, or whether the party elders pull a Barry Goldwater (who told Richard Nixon to resign in 1974) and ask to her get out sooner rather than later.

What changed things? It may take a few days to sort out, but I have to agree with those who say that Clinton may have made a huge blunder in pushing the gas tax "holiday," that maybe P.T. Barnum really was wrong about underestimating the American public. Not only did some voters likely agree wigth Obama was that it was a shameless ploy. but it may have succeeded in doing what Obama himself had not been able to do, and take the Rev. Jeremiah Wright off the front page.

Well, Chris Matthews just started singing about Gary, Indiana on MSNBC, which means it's probably time for me to go home. Hillary ought to be right behind me.