Da Man

Barack Obama is preparing to claim victory in the Democratic presidential nominating contest after next Tuesday's final primaries in Montana and South Dakota.

In a question and answer session Wednesday night with reporters on his campaign plane between Denver and Chicago, the Illinois senator dismissed the idea that rival Hillary Clinton's stated willingness to take her fight for the nomination to the party convention in late August would matter.

"When Dukakis won the nomination, you know, Jesse (Jackson) was still running until the convention," Obama said. "When Bill Clinton was running, Jerry Brown was still technically in it. As far as I can tell, this is fairly standard fare."

Obama said the nominee would be clear "after Tuesday." "I am sure we will have discussions with Senator Clinton and her team," he said.

He predicted that after the last primaries, "whatever remaining super delegates will make their decisions pretty quickly after that."

"If we've got the number of delegates to secure the