I noted earlier that Howard Fineman said on MSNBC that people within both the Clinton and Obama’s camp had come to believe that it was “highly unlikely” for Clinton to win with pledged delegates. Now the Obama campaign is backing up the idea saying it is “next to impossible” for Clinton to take the lead.

David Plouffe told a conference call of supporters “We have created such a buffer in terms of the pledge delegate lead that we think it is highly unlikely that it will be eroded”. (Also reported at Politico)

“It is next to impossible for Senator Clinton to close that pledge delegate count,” he said. “The only way she can do it is win contests [later, he specifically mentioned Texas and Ohio] by 25 to 30 points. And we don’t see contests were she can do that.”

The Clinton camp has countered the notion saying:

We think that at the end of the day on March 4 we will be within 25 delegates,” said Clinton aide Guy Cecil, before adding that the margin would be less than 1 percent of total delegates committed.