Clinton strategist Mark Penn and Guy Cecil held a conference call with reporters earlier today.

Mark Penn: It’s a chase to Texas, Ohio and Pennsylvania, which have close to 500 delegates, 54 percent of the remaining delegates that she needs to win…

The Texas primary in the past has been 25 percent Latino, this year could be as much as 45-50 percent. Ohio is a state with which wants a focus on economic, middle class problems…

In this race all along, just as things look like they’re going in one direction, they go in another direction. On March 4, we expect to be back in a competitive position.

Jimmy Carter lost 22 states before winning Ohio and California.

Guy Cecil: We will be opening offices in all of the remaining states. We are recommitting and redoubling our efforts. We have the largest and best-organized grassroots efforts in all of the states remaining. We feel very good about getting the delegates we need, and we feel very good about where we will be at the end of March 4.

#more#

After hearing the Clinton campaign talk about all the large states they had won, I was reminded of this e-mail I was sent earlier today:

Take a look at the West Wing Season 6, at one point Bradley Whitford makes the argument when they get to the convention.
He asks, ‘Are the superdelegates really going to pass on nominating the candidate that won California, Texas, New York, Florida, Michigan, Illinois, Ohio, and Pennsylvania?’
Of courser in the West Wing, the candidate was the great speaker, and the establishment guys lost.

The problem with that approach is that it says to voters in places like Iowa, Georgia, Virginia, Maryland, Colorado – not exactly small states, and some purple ones — “you don’t matter.” And Obama didn’t compete in two of the big ones (Florida, Michigan) and has won his share of big states (Illinois, Missouri)

It’s an audacious argument to say that some states don’t matter. Call it “the Audacity of Nope.”