NEW YORK, May 7: Most political experts, newspaper columnists and writers predicted on Wednesday that with the decisive victory in North Carolina democratic primary, Senator Barack Obama would ultimately prevail over his tough rival Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton in securing the nomination of his party for the presidency of the United States.

Senator Clinton won the Indiana state primary by two percentage points a far less margin than her campaign had anticipated.

The results from the two primaries, the largest remaining Democratic ones, indicated that Senator Obama would widen his lead in pledged delegates count and make it almost impossible for Mrs Clinton to catch up.

“Don’t ever forget that we have a choice in this country,” Obama said in a speech in North Carolina. “We can choose not to be divided; that we can choose not to be afraid; that we can still choose this moment to finally come together and solve the problems we’ve talked about all those other years in all those other elections.”

“You know, there are those who were saying that North Carolina would be a game-changer in this election,” Obama told a roaring crowd in Raleigh, N.C., on Tuesday night, referring to Clinton’s hope that an upset there would recast the race in her favour.

Mr Obama — whose campaign was undermined by controversy over the controversial remarks of his former pastor — recorded his first primary victory in nearly two months.

Mrs Clinton addressed her supporters at a rally in Indianapolis on Tuesday evening, said tonight, I need your help to continue this journey Clinton vowed to compete tenaciously for West Virginia next week and Kentucky and Oregon after that, and to press “full speed on to the White House.”

And she pledged anew that she would support the Democratic nominee “no matter what happens,” a vow also made by her competitor.

In both states, Clinton won six in 10 white votes while Obama got nine in 10 black votes, exit polls indicated.

The New York Times observed that Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton is bracing for one of the most difficult days of her presidential race on Wednesday, anticipating new pressure to quit the race and facing a set of financial and logistical decisions that will determine just how robust a campaign she can continue to wage against Sen Barack Obama, according to several advisers and political allies.

The advisers and allies to Mrs Clinton said on Tuesday night that her victory in Indiana — even by less than 2 percentage points — made it less certain that she would withdraw from the race. (Her advisers had said a loss would likely lead her to quit.) Yet these supporters said that North Carolina had come to be seen as a major test in the eyes of the Clintons and their aides, and the severity of her loss to Mr Obama there was dispiriting.

They were also girding for the possibility of more bad news. Her campaign is deep in debt and believed to be near broke, and her advisers made the unusual move on Tuesday night of refusing to confirm or deny whether Mrs Clinton had made a loan to her campaign to keep it afloat. She made such a loan of $5 million, in January, and she pleaded for donations in her televised primary night remarks on Tuesday, even reminding people that they could donate on her website.

Mrs Clinton did add an event on Wednesday in West Virginia, which holds its primary on Tuesday, as a way to demonstrate that she remains politically viable. But even some of her most optimistic supporters were measured in their comments on Tuesday night about how well-positioned she was to stay in the race.

“It’s hard to answer that question — she has lost in North Carolina but it looks like she won Indiana, which everyone expected,” Alan Patricof, one of Mrs Clinton’s national finance chairmen told the Times. “I think she’s committed to going forward, but it’s hard to know — she is the one to make the decision about what she does. And a lot of us have trust and faith in her to make the best decision.”

Clinton advisers said that the results were far from the best outcome that Mrs Clinton could have expected — a strong win in Indiana and a narrow loss in North Carolina — and left her camp certain that she would face new calls to leave the race. But they said they had arguments ready to combat those calls: Mrs Clinton did have a victory on Tuesday night; blue-collar voters, women, and white voters were still behind her in strong numbers; and her votes in the unsanctioned Florida and Michigan primaries.