Clinton wins Rhode Island and Ohio - Leads in Texas

Making good on her promise to throw everything including the kitchen sink at her Democratic opponent Hillary Clinton took Rhode Island earlier this evening. Mrs. Clinton is also the projected winner in Ohio taking 56% of the vote to 42% for rival Obama with 66% of the State's precincts reporting. Ohio voters cited their perceptions that the economy is in trouble and that the country needs a change in direction. Democratic Ohioans have some antipathy for NAFTA and free trade with foreign countries and CBS News notes that NAFTA was a important in the Ohio race. Recent revelations that a senior Obama economic advisor visited the Canadian counsel general in Chicago to assure him that Obama's anti-NAFTA statements were "just campaign rhetoric" could not have helped the Senator in the Buckeye State.

Mrs. Clinton also took the lead in Texas where she had trailed the Illinois Senator during earlier polling. The Senator from New York now leads by a margin of 50% to Obama's 48% with 56% of the precincts reporting. Several problems were reported earlier in the evening with Clinton campaign officials accusations that Obama supporters were improperly padding the caucus vote total. Contention between the two camps was evident tonight when Clinton's campaign communications director Howard Wolfson and Obama campaign lawyer Bob Bauer traded barbs and accusations during this heated exchange after Bauer called in on a Clinton campaign conference call with reporters.

This promises to be a long night.