This week's Pennsylvania primary granted Senator Hillary Clinton (D-NY) the victory she was hoping would justify her continued bid for the presidency. Her recent victory over Senator Barack Obama (D-IL) follows her earlier big wins in Ohio, Texas, and New York. However, the result of the Pennsylvania vote leaves Democratic Party leaders and American voters alike wondering how long this contest will continue and which candidate will receive the Party's nomination in at the Democratic National Convention in August.

Despite winning 55% of the Pennsylvania vote, Senator Clinton received a modest victory in that state with only approximately 215,000 votes separating her from Senator Obama. The nearly ten point difference between the candidates has had a marginal effect on Obama, who has managed to maintain his lead in the overall delegate count. According to CNN, the Illinois Senator has 1,724 delegates (both pledged and super) while Clinton trails him by 135 delegates (for a total of 1,589 pledged and superdelegates). This means that even if she makes significant strides to close the gap in the remaining primary contests, neither Senator Clinton nor Senator Obama will have secured the 2,025 delegates required to win the Democratic Party's nomination.

The six weeks leading up to the Pennsylvania primary were fraught with attacks made by both Democratic candidates against one another. On the one hand, the Clinton campaign questioned whether Obama's level of experience has adequately prepared him for the presidency while touting her own readiness for the role.

During The Compassion Forum, hosted by Messiah College and sponsored by Faith In Public Life, Clinton also raised concern over Obama's statement at a closed-door fundraiser in San Francisco, where he stated that small town people have "gotten bitter and [clung] to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them...as a way to explain their frustrations" and called his comments "elitist, out of touch, and frankly, patronizing."

In an attempt to explain the "bitter" comment, Obama stated that "when economic hardship hits in these communities, what people have is...family, they've got their faith, they've got the traditions that have been passed on to them from generation to generation. Those aren't bad things, that's what they have left. And unfortunately, what people have become bitter about...is any confidence that the government is listening to them."

Obama has also criticized Clinton for her voting record, in particular her vote in 2002 authorizing U.S. troops to invade Iraq (which Obama has repeatedly stated he would have voted against had he been in office at the time), and her support for the 2001 USA PATRIOT Act, two issues which have proven highly contentious among Americans since their ratification.

Unfortunately, the wrangling between the Obama and Clinton camps may have the effect of polarizing the Democratic Party and distracting both the candidates and the voters from the issues facing our country; many pundits and proponents of change fear this will negatively affect the election of a Democratic president in November. This also raises concerns about the electability of the Democratic candidate against the presumptive Republican nominee, Senator John McCain (R-AZ), who in recent months, has taken his time to present himself to a wider group of voters.

In her victory speech in Philadelphia on Tuesday night, Clinton said that the "tide is turning." With less than a dozen primary contests remaining until the Democratic National Convention in August, there are few big states up for grabs. The road to determining a nominee for the Democratic presidential ticket will be more or less a toe-to-toe contest until the final primary results are counted in early June. How close either candidate will come to achieving the 2,025 delegates necessary to win the Democratic Party's nomination will affect how a nominee will be chosen at the DNC, and to what extent the disputed superdelegates will in fact play a role in this process.

While it is inevitable that we endure the arguments that are sure to ensue, we as voters must demand that the presidential candidates remain focused on the policy issues affecting our country and America's relationship with the world. With people of all backgrounds and levels of civic participation voting in record numbers in this election cycle, the candidates' challenge is to project a vision to unify this country and to speak to the pressing issues facing America today. As such, we as Muslim Americans must seize this opportunity to think critically about the candidates' policies and to drive our country to be one whose actions are rooted in knowledge and reason, and not driven by fear.

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