Two weeks before the final primary in their marathon battle, Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton were campaigning hard Wednesday. Both were in Florida, but their goals could hardly have been more different _ or said more about how each one hopes to bring their historic race to a close.

Obama, feeling sure of the Democratic nomination, was trying to stake an early claim to a state that could be crucial in the general election against Republican John McCain. Clinton, insisting she can still be her party's nominee, was making an impassioned plea for the state's disputed primary results to be counted.

Obama plans to contest the final three primaries in Puerto Rico, South Dakota and Montana, but he is already moving on, well into the early stages of a general election plan that will take him to other critical swing states in the coming weeks.

His campaign was offering some new delegate math _ before the last votes were cast.

Because of how the party allocates its delegates, Obama almost certainly cannot win the nomination based on the 86 pledged delegates yet to be claimed in the final three contests. But his advisers project that he needs just 25 to 28 more superdelegates to come aboard by the end of the primaries to put him over the top.

The campaign's estimate were confirmed through a separate tabulation by The Associated Press.

As for Clinton, aides said she has two immediate goals: to see the results of the Florida and Michigan primaries restored, and to persuade the remaining uncommitted superdelegates that she would be the better candidate in November against McCain.

While she has signaled that the race will soon end after the final primaries June 3, Clinton is also counting on a meeting of the Democratic Party's rules committee May 31 to bring an end to the dispute over Michigan and Florida, whose delegates were striped after they violated party rules by moving up their contests.

If the committee does not satisfactorily resolve the matter, the New York senator hinted Wednesday she would support a drawn-out battle that could go to the party's convention in August.

"Yes I will. I will, because I feel very strongly about this," Clinton said in an interview with The Associated Press when asked whether her campaign would support Michigan and Florida if they pressed the issue into the summer.

Still, all signs overwhelmingly indicate that Obama will emerge as the Democratic standard-bearer.

A handful of superdelegate endorsements Wednesday on top of primary results in Kentucky and Oregon have brought him within striking distance of claiming the nomination _ the Illinois senator is 64 delegates from the 2,026 needed under Democratic Party rules as well as close to becoming the first black nominee of a major party.

In the past, primary results have touched off a wave of superdelegates. It was just a few Wednesday. Privately, Obama strategists said they believed a number were still inclined to wait until after the primaries are over out of respect for the Clintons, who remain major figures within the party.

Joe Andrew, a former DNC chairman and superdelegate who switched allegiance from Clinton to Obama, said that while Obama reaching the majority of pledged delegates was a symbolic moment, "delegates aren't just looking for moments. They are looking for reasons to make a decision that many of them know that is probably inevitable."

He added that until the race ends, "I think they will portray themselves as genuinely torn. I don't mean to say they are play acting. I think most of them in their gut have made their decision. I think they are torn about how to explain that decision and when they should announce." Continued...