Jay Cost (as usual) has a good piece on the role of the superdelegates. It expands on what I was saying yesterday about how Hillary needs to prep the environment if she going to win over the superdelegate primary. In fact, that is exactly what Ickes and others should be calling the race to win the supers. It’s just another primary! Alternatively, as a couple readers suggested, the Clintons could compare the normal delegates to the House of Representatives and the supers to the Senate. They each have their role, blah, blah, blah. Anyway, an excerpt from Cost’s piece (also linked in the NRO briefing):

Neither Clinton nor Obama can expect to win the nomination by virtue of the pledged delegates alone. Obama would have to win more than 75% of the remaining delegates. Clinton needs more than are available. Thus, the nominee will have to fill the gap via the super delegates.
This is critically important. The nominee will be the one who makes a compelling argument to a sufficient number of the 795 super delegates. This is the first reason not to be so quick to declare the race finished. Do we know what these delegates are thinking? We have no survey data on them – nothing that gauges their preferences or beliefs. We can easily track how candidates are doing when their audience is the American public. That’s what opinion polls are for. We have nothing of the sort for the super delegates.
Even though we do not know what these super delegates will decide, we can draw a general outline of how they might decide. Doing so should demonstrate just how complicated matters could become. Their decision will hinge upon their answers to two general questions:
(A) Which candidate is better for the party? (B) Which candidate is better for me? Super delegates are free to answers these questions however they like. They are also free to weigh the answers however they like. They can be selfish or sefless – whichever they prefer. That’s what makes them super. This adds another dimension of uncertainty. Not only do we have few indications about their thought processes, we know that their thought processes are unconstrained by any party rules.