Ambinder:

Still, big victories in West Virginia and Kentucky will help Clinton make the argument that she is indispensable.

Sullivan:

What Obama needs to do is fight hard in those states to keep her victories muted.

Actually, what he needs to do is to change the subject and act as if these primaries are not happening (or, to borrow a page from the Clintons, to claim that they “don’t really count”), because there is simply no way that he is going to change the powerful opposition to him in these states.  Imagine the resistance that he faced in the Monongahela Valley, and then expand it to include entire states, and you have an idea of what he’s up against.  Among white Democrats in Kentucky, he has a 51% unfav rating.  He has a 45% unfav rating among 18-29 year olds , and 12% very unfavourable among black voters, and this is in a closed primary.  Those 30-39 year olds really don’t like him–they go for Clinton 67-20.  He is set to lose both states by 25+ points, and large numbers (40% in both states) say they are unlikely to vote for him in the fall.  West Virginia is in some ways more bleak: 24% of black voters view him very unfavourably there, he has an overall unfav rating of 50%, and trails Clinton by almost thirty.  If she wins late deciding voters as she often does (and did again yesterday), we could be looking at 40+ point margins.  The less attention he brings to these primaries, the better for him.  McCain has problems unifying his party, but they are as nothing compared to this.

P.S. This is also why she isn’t going to go away for the next month, despite the certainty that she will not be the nominee.  As the old line put it, she’s come too long, too far, too slow to stop now.  Obama boosters will be having fits for weeks, denouncing Clinton in ever-more vituperative ways, which will work to aggravate the already difficult task of unifying the party..