Keller @ Large: The State Of The Race
BOSTON (CBS) - After Tuesday night's primary results, there's no doubt where both parties are headed, albeit one more emphatically than the other.
Let's start with the biggest winner of the night, Hillary Clinton. No surprise that she romped in Florida and North Carolina, as part of her virtually uncontested march through the South. But after Bernie Sanders' upset victory in Michigan last week, the question was -- could he duplicate that in the comparably-troubled Midwestern industrial state of Ohio?
Read: 'On The Issues' – Where The Candidates Stand
Answer - no, and given the discontent there over trade deals that Clinton backed and the status quo she represents, you have to wonder where Sanders thinks he can make up serious ground?
Check: Delegate Scorecard
On the GOP side, Donald Trump was also a winner, but nowhere near as conclusively.
His impressive win in Florida was neutralized in part by his loss in Ohio to John Kasich. And with Ted Cruz grabbing his share in the non-winner-take-all states of Illinois and North Carolina, Trump needs to win more than 60 percent of the delegates the rest of the way to clinch a first-ballot nomination.
Can he do it? There are only two winner-take-all primaries between now and April 26th, in Arizona and Wisconsin, where Trump should do well. That gives him more than a month to find a way to defuse the formidable anti-Trump sentiment within the party, and he'd better get on it - exit polls find backers of now-former candidate Marco Rubio would break four-to-one for Cruz.
We've learned all about Trump's uncanny feel for voter anger and popular culture. We're about to see if diplomacy is also one of his skills.