At MSNBC, Mark Murray writes that upcoming states favor Obama, from Saturday's votes in Louisiana, Nebraska and Washington up to and including Feb. 19 votes in Hawaii and Wisconsin.

In fact, in a conference call it held with reporters on Monday, the Clinton campaign seemed like it was conceding those states when it didn’t mention those states, but said it was looking ahead toward March 4 (Ohio and Texas; don't forget Rhode Island and Vermont) after Super Tuesday.

Lowering expectations is a big part of the game at this point. Last night, the Clinton campaign was quick to send out talking points to its surrogates. After every loss the suggested line was that Clinton had not campaigned very hard in that state so it was no surprise that Obama did better. Will that be Washington's fate?

Arguing against that is the sudden influx of Clinton staffers to the state in recent days. And I'm confident the campaign will tell anyone in Washington state that it will fight hard here. But one has to wonder why that wasn't said in a conversation this morning with national reporters.