There are just 8 days left until VOTR Day, when Vermont, Ohio, Rhode Island and Texas go to the polls and–in all likelihood–decide the Democratic nominee.

On the Democratic side, it’s do-or-die for Hillary Clinton. Her campaign–through surrogates like James Carville and Bill Clinton–has said that winning TX and OH are crucial to her campaign. If she doesn’t walk away with both states under her belt, there will be tremendous pressure on Clinton to step aside and allow Obama to start campaigning as the nominee.

To that extent, things aren’t looking good for Clinton. Pollster shows Obama moving up in both OH and TX; though Clinton is still up by 10 points in the Buckeye State, her lead has been cut down significantly in recent days. In Texas, Clinton’s lead has been cut down to nothing; she and Obama are now tied.

ARG has Obama leading by 8% in TX, but losing by 10% on OH. PPP has Clinton leading Obama by 4% in Ohio, while CNN has Obama leading Clinton by 4% in Texas.

No matter how you cut it, things are too close for comfort for Hillary Clinton. If Obama continues building momentum at the rate he has, he’ll almost certainly walk away with Texas and, quite possibly, Ohio. Clinton is going to have to act now to stop his momentum, and I’m not sure if the strategy they’re adopting–going extremely negative–will reverse their fortunes.

Clinton is giving a major policy address tonight at George Washington University in Washington, DC–hopefully for her, she’ll unveil a new strategy for her flagging campaign. As for Obama, the ground he’s made up since Super Tuesday has been impressive–he has weathered extremely negative attacks and sharp criticisms, and he has always come out on top. Right now, Obama is leading nationally, showing that his campaign has a bright future ahead of them.

On the Republican side, John McCain hasn’t even won the nomination and he’s already in serious trouble.

The Vicki Iseman/Lobbygate scandal has shown McCain’s uncomfortably close relationship to special interests, and that his top campaign advisers are corporate lobbyists. The FEC fracas has demolished his image as a campaign finance reformer; his potentially-illegal attempt to weasel out of public financing rules could land his campaign in court.

As the McCain campaign takes hit after hit in the court of public opinion, there’s talk that Mitt Romney may re-ignite his suspended Presidential campaign. I don’t consider it a very likely scenario–Romney has already endorsed McCain, and he’s clearly hoping to use his 300 delegates to become the Vice Presidential candidate.

If Romney chooses to jump back in, his best bet would be to win at the convention, winning over McCain’s pledged delegates by capitalizing off of their buyer’s remorse in the wake of these scandals.

Nonetheless, it seems like a news cycle doesn’t go by without McCain shooting himself in the foot. Witness his latest statement on Iraq:

My friends, the war will be over soon, the war for all intents and purposes although the insurgency will go on for years and years and years. But it will be handled by the Iraqis, not by us, and then we decide what kind of security arrangement we want to have with the Iraqis.

Of course, we’ve heard this kind of happy talk before–not just from George Bush and Dick Cheney, but from McCain himself:

I think the victory will be rapid, within about three weeks. [MSNBC, 1/28/03]

It’s clear that the end is very much in sight. … It won’t be long. It, it’ll be a fairly short period of time. [ABC, 4/9/03]

We’re either going to lose this thing or win this thing within the next several months. [Meet The Press, 11/12/06]

And does it really matter how close to “victory” we are if we’re going to be in Iraq for–as McCain said–10,000 years?

John McCain: worse than Bush’s third term.

Still, the race is still extremely fluid, and a lot can change in the coming days. Make sure to check back for developments in this very contentious primary season.

UPDATE: Here’s the article from GW’s student newspaper covering Clinton’s remarks in DC today.