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John Edwards has endorsed Barack Obama for President. They both gave great speeches with no small amount of praise for Sen. Clinton as well. Both stressed the need for unity against the Republicans this fall.

I would support an Obama/Edwards ticket more than an Obama/Clinton ticket, but I don’t think Edwards will wind up on the ticket. Something tells me Obama is going to have a lot of pressure from the party to put Clinton on his ticket in the interest of unity.

Sen. Obama lost West Virginia by a hefty margin, but his superdelegate gains over the past week and change basically negate the gain for Sen. Clinton there. He’s still right where he was; poised to win the nomination. It does however draw more attention to the problem Sen. Obama has in Appalachia. I don’t think this will be enough to lose the election for him, but does concern me quite a bit.

I’m hoping that Edwards’ endorsement can help with that problem in Kentucky, though I’m doubting that will be the case. I do expect it will pull some more superdelegates into the Obama column. I’m also wondering if we should be watching for an Elizabeth Edwards endorsement of Sen. Clinton in the next few days.

Endorsements or no, Sen. Obama’s lead is nearly insurmountable at this point. I think he’ll win in easily in Oregon and South Dakota, with a closer victory in Montana. Sen. Clinton will win Kentucky and Puerto Rico by a large margin and may challenge for the popular vote win once Florida and Michigan are added. I do think Florida and Michigan will have their delegations seated. While they knew the rules and I vehemently disagree with changing them now, the party can’t stand the fallout from not having Florida and Michigan at the convention.

One other thought on West Virginia: Obama really should have thanked his supporters there. I was disappointed that there was nothing from the Obama campaign after the contest. It would have sent a stronger unity message for him to have spoken a few words, even if it wasn’t in a rally environment.