Black political observers said Tuesday that despite Hillary Clinton’s convincing but largely symbolic victory in the West Virginia primary, Barack Obama is still on track to become the nation’s first African-American Democratic presidential nominee.

"Barack Obama’s decision to move on to the general election is his signal that the nomination is his, and it's time to move on without saying it," Peter C. Groff, a Colorado state senator, publisher of Blackpolicy.org and executive director of the Center for African-American Policy at the University of Denver, told BlackAmericaWeb.com Tuesday.

"It is a great political move and allows the party to advance, but also allows Hillary Clinton to phase out her effort," Groff said. "The move also allows him to test fall themes and messages before the American people tune in."

Clinton, who won 67 percent of the vote in West Virginia Tuesday versus Obama's 26 percent, expected a big victory but had little hope it would alter the presidential race, with frontrunner Obama already focusing on the general election. Only five Democratic primaries remain, and pollsters say it’s mathematically impossible for Clinton to catch or overtake Obama. More troubling, Clinton’s campaign is $20 million in debt.

Still, she told a rally in West Virginia Tuesday night that she is moving forward, saying she is the strongest candidate and would be the strongest president.

"I am more determined than ever to carry on this campaign until everyone has had a chance to make their voices heard," Clinton told a cheering crowd. "This race isn't over yet. Neither of us has the total delegates it takes to win. ... The White House is won in the swing states. And I am winning the swing states. With your help, I am ready to go head-to-head with John McCain."

Meanwhile, Obama has picked up 26 superdelegates in the past week. He’s now poised to close in on 2,025 -- the total number of delegates needed to clinch the nomination -- in the next three weeks.

His wave of superdelegate endorsements puts Obama within reach of the Democratic presidential nomination by the end of the primary season on June 3, even if he loses half of the remaining five contests.

Craig Kirby, a Democratic political strategist, said he believes the superdelegates are listening to the voices and, seemingly, the will of the people.

"They are making both rational and prudent decisions that they believe will change the course America is currently headed," Kirby told BlackAmericaWeb.com Tuesday.

On Tuesday, Obama conceded defeat in advance, looking ahead to the Oregon primary later in the month and the campaign against McCain, the Republican nominee.

"This is our chance to build a new majority of Democrats and independents and Republicans who know that four more years of George Bush just won't do," he said in remarks prepared for an evening appearance in Missouri, which looms as a battleground state in the fall. "This is our moment to turn the page on the divisions and distractions that pass for politics in Washington."

For their part, black professionals in West Virginia offered several reasons for Obama’s defeat Tuesday.

"West Virginia is an interesting state. We have small, minuscule African-American population, but we’ve had three members in the House of Delegates, and they have done quite well over the years," Woodrow Berry, a law professor at Marshall University, told BlackAmericaWeb.com Tuesday.

Berry said he didn’t think race was as much as factor in Tuesday’s contest as it was a lack of familiarity with Obama.

Karen Nance, treasurer of the Cabell County Democratic Women’s Club in West Virginia, said she believed some West Virginia voters were upset because they thought Clinton was being pressured to end her campaign before the primary.

"I think there are a lot of people who are angry," Nance told BlackAmericaWeb.com.

Other political observers said Obama’s defeat in West Virginia further proves that he does not connect with rural, working-class white voters and would have trouble winning them in the general election.

Clinton's best chance to slow Obama is to move the goal posts. She will get that chance May 31 when the Democratic National Committee's rules panel considers proposals to seat the delegates that had been stripped from Florida and Michigan. Those two states violated national party rules by holding their primaries in January and lost their delegates.

"Michigan and Florida are key to it," Howard Wolfson, Clinton's communications director, said Monday.

Traci Blunt, a spokeswoman for the Clinton campaign, said Clinton is still in the hunt.

"The campaign believes that Florida and Michigan should be seated at the convention," Blunt told BlackAmericaWeb.com. "This is not going to be a convention of only 48 delegations. This is a country of 50 states, and it should be a convention of 50 state delegations," Blunt said Tuesday.

"Every state should be represented," she added. "Senator Clinton won significant victories in both Florida and Michigan, and the delegations from those states ought to be seated, commensurate with the results from those primaries. And it is our hope and our expectation that will happen."

Michelle Bernard, president of the Independent Women’s Voice and a political analyst for MSNBC, said despite Clinton's decisive victory in West Virginia and her expected win in next week's Kentucky primary, "Obama's staggering lead in pledged delegates, contests won and now superdelegates does not provide her with a clear path to the Democratic nomination."

"Although the Obama campaign continues to acknowledge that Senator Clinton is still a part of the Democratic process, he also has made a full pivot towards the general election and has begun to campaign against Senator McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee," Bernard told BlackAmericaWeb.com. "In effect, the general election campaign has begun, and it is between senators Obama and McCain."

Obama has 1,875 delegates, including endorsements from party and elected officials known as superdelegates. Clinton has 1,712, according to the latest tally by The Associated Press. That leaves Obama just 150 delegates short of the number needed to win the nomination at the party's national convention this August in Denver. Clinton is 313 delegates short.

There are 189 delegates at stake in the five remaining primaries in Kentucky, Oregon, Puerto Rico, Montana and South Dakota. Even if Clinton wins most of those delegates, Obama could reach the magic number by the time South Dakota and Montana vote on June 3.

Obama has been careful not to declare himself the nominee prematurely, even as his campaign focuses increasingly on McCain. Clinton's campaign, meanwhile, has outlined a strategy for winning the nomination that extends beyond the end of the primaries.

The battle might not last that long.

The Obama campaign issued this statement early Tuesday: "Barack Obama leads in pledged delegates, contests won and superdelegates. And for perspective, while 28 pledged delegates are up for grabs this evening, Obama has won the support of 27 superdelegates in the course of just the last week, putting him less than 150 total delegates away from clinching the Democratic nomination."

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Associated Press contributed to this story.