NEDRA PICKLER

The Associated Press

WASHINGTON – Hillary Clinton should savor the moment. Soon enough, she must face the reality of time and money running out on her once-invincible campaign.

Her win Tuesday in the important swing state of Pennsylvania was hard-fought and decisive. Barack Obama’s well-funded effort to shut her down did not come close to an upset.

But despite her victory, the dynamics of the race are the same as they’ve been for more than two months. Obama remains the front-runner, and that gets more important the closer the campaign comes to the end of the primary season.

“He’s content to essentially run out the clock with his narrow lead, while she needs something dramatic to happen,” said California-based Democratic consultant Dan Newman. “A one-run advantage in the first inning isn’t a big deal, but a one-run lead in the ninth looms large.”

Clinton faces a dwindling number of contests, and she’s at a steep financial disadvantage.

Obama already is spending twice as much on ads airing in North Carolina and Indiana, the two states that come up next, with primaries on May 6. He’s even advertising in Oregon, a state that he should win, where voting by mail begins in the first week of May.

Obama can afford to shower every contest with campaign dollars from the $42 million he had at the beginning of April, while Clinton is in debt. She’ll have to either persuade donors to give her more money to sustain her long-shot bid or float herself another multimillion- dollar loan.

Then she’ll face the uphill battle of convincing the party’s elected officials and leaders – the superdelegates – to reject the front-runner Obama in favor of her.

“She has to convince superdelegates that her survival as a candidate doesn’t come at the cost of jeopardizing the long-term survival of the party in the fall and in the future,” said Democratic consultant Jenny Backus. “And that is a tough argument to make.”

Underscoring the race’s excitement, more than 1 in 10 voters Tuesday had registered with the state Democratic Party since the beginning of the year. And about 6 in 10 of them were voting for Obama.

Some voters had a hard time making up their minds. About a quarter of the day’s voters reported having decided within the past week, and about 6 in 10 of them backed Clinton.

She found reason for optimism in the victory that came even though Obama outspent her 3-to-1 in the state.

“He broke every spending record in this state trying to knock us out of this race,” Clinton told her cheering supporters. “Well, the people of Pennsylvania had other ideas tonight.”

Clinton also went into Pennsylvania with a big advantage: The demographics matched her strengths and she started with a steep lead in the polls. She won’t have that kind of advantage in the coming contests.

Of the states left, the biggest prize is North Carolina, where both sides predicted Obama will win. Clinton dispatched one of her top state organizers, California and Texas veteran Ace Smith, to North Carolina in an effort to get every vote she can. Smith told reporters last week that getting the percentage spread within single digits would be a victory for Clinton. Obama’s also expected to win Oregon and South Dakota.

So where can she look for victory? West Virginia and Kentucky are likely Clinton wins, but they offer fewer than 100 delegates combined. She also has a chance in Guam, Puerto Rico, Montana and Indiana. But none of them is likely to give her a big enough margin to put her over Obama.

To win, she needs to convince voters that Obama is not electable in November even though he’s ahead in the delegate race.

She needs a big influx of cash.

She needs a stunning change of fortune.

By NEDRA PICKLER

The Associated Press

WASHINGTON – Potential safety problems in the vehicles on American roadways are not always being identified by the federal agency responsible for investigating them, a Transportation Department audit says.

The department’s inspector general found the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s database of consumer complaints includes inaccurate and incomplete information.

In some cases, the staff of NHTSA’s Office of Defects Investigation recommended an investigation after receiving what it considered serious complaints, but no investigation was opened, according to the report, requested by Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., in September 2000.

The audit recommends NHTSA overhaul the way it collects and evaluates complaints about potentially dangerous vehicles and establish a peer review panel to ensure high-priority cases are investigated.

In a response included in the audit, NHTSA defended its record, noting the number of vehicle recalls has increased steadily in the past decade and that very few serious defects have escaped its attention. Still, it agreed to develop new defect analysis procedures.

There are no set guidelines for when NHTSA must open an investigation. Factors include the number and seriousness of the complaints. However, the report found inconsistencies in the process, including several cases where deaths did not lead to probes.

NHTSA largely relies on vehicle manufacturers and consumer complaints to uncover safety defects. Vehicle owners can report problems to NHTSA by calling (888) 327-4236 or visiting the department website at www.nhtsa.dot.gov.

A report says that by 2030, drivers 65 and older will be involved in a quarter of fatal traffic accidents.

By NEDRA PICKLER

Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON – As baby boomers swell the elderly population, auto insurers would like to see cars and roadways that make more allowances for brittle bones and poor eyesight, including limits on air bag forces and road signs that are easier to read.

Drivers 65 and older will be involved in a quarter of all fatal traffic crashes by 2030, the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety predicts in a report released today.

“Seniors are more fragile, so when they get injured, they die,” said study author Susan Ferguson.

“I think a lot of people think that elderly drivers are a menace to road users, and there is nothing in our data that shows that. They are just a menace to themselves because they die more often in crashes.”

The institute found drivers 70-74 are twice as likely to die in a crash as those 30-59.

And among drivers 80 and older, the risk of death is about five times as high.

A 1997 Federal Highway Administration study found that older drivers have a harder time seeing and understanding road signs than young and middle-age drivers.

The agency recommends communities make signs easier to read by using simpler designs, adding fewer details and using a color that contrasts sharply with the background.

The Michigan State Police Department is encouraging communities to use larger lettering on street signs and to erect signs warning motorists of approaching traffic lights.

The Michigan department also suggests reducing the number of signs at busy intersections.

In Rochester Hills, a suburb of Detroit, crashes have decreased since changes were made, said Betty Mercer, division director of the Office of Highway Safety Planning.

“They were able to demonstrate that it not only helped older drivers, it helps all drivers,” she said.

The Insurance Institute report calls for automakers to improve ergonomics for older motorists, install less rigid seat belt systems that won’t cause shoulders and ribs to break, and use air bags that inflate with less force.

When designing cars and trucks, engineers at Ford Motor Co. use a “third- age suit” that adds bulk, restricts joint movement, reduces the sense of touch and has yellow goggles that simulate cataracts to reflect problems that affect older drivers.

Ford also has designed an advanced safety system that collects information to determine how closely a driver is sitting to the steering wheel, whether front seat occupants are wearing safety belts and accident severity.

The system uses the information to control seat belts and air bags to ensure both accommodate older motorists.

The system was introduced for the 2000 Ford Taurus and Mercury Sable, and Ford plans to offer it standard in all vehicles in a few years.

“We want to protect everybody, but the biggest benefit is for seniors,” Ford spokeswoman Sara Tatchio said.

“We know that one of the audiences that we have to focus on for safety is seniors,” she said.

The report also called for more alternative transportation so seniors don’t have to drive.

Seniors often can’t use buses and other public transportation because they have to walk too far to reach the stops, according to the report.

The report cited Portland, Maine’s nonprofit Independent Transportation Network as one type of solution.

It operates like a taxi service for seniors at all hours of the day.

Some have suggested seniors should have to pass driving tests to keep their licenses.

But Ferguson said the tests often are not effective in predicting who will be involved in a crash. She said what you will end up doing is removing the licenses of a lot of people who have not been any kind of threat on the roads.