Is Clinton writing North Carolina off?

Well, just when we thought North Carolina may get a little attention from the Democratic candidates for president, this article appears in the Raleigh News & Observer and the Charolotte Observer today:

(an excerpt)
“Barack Obama’s campaign says Hillary Clinton is writing off North Carolina.
In a conference call Wednesday, Obama spokesman Robert Gibbs attacked a Clinton adviser’s statement that North Carolina and other so-called red states are “virtually irrelevant” to the Democratic candidate in the general election.
“You have … the Clinton campaign basically ruling out North Carolina in the general election and already waving a white flag,” he said. “We believe this speaks to their weakness in those states as a general-election candidate.”
In Wednesday’s New York Times, senior Clinton adviser Harold Ickes argued that Obama was winning states that typically go Republican in November.

To me, it’s looking more and more like neither candidate will make a big splash campaigning here. Consider the following:
• Neither candidate can realistically get enough delegates by winning popular votes in the states left. Even though North Carolina is second to only Pennsylvania in delegates for states that have yet to hold a primary, it will probably mean little for either candidate who wins the state. The superdelegates will end up determining who the candidate is.
• Florida may actually get a “revote,” meaning North Carolina will become even less important. Leave it to Florida to mess up an election again.
• North Carolina appears it will fall in line with its neighbors — South Carolina, Georgia, Virginia — and go with Obama. If I’m in Hillary’s campaign, I see very little reason to stump here … unless she just wants to keep up the momentum after wins in Ohio, Texas and possibly Pennsylvania.

Despite the stereotype for journalists, I will not be able to vote in a Democratic primary, though I really wish both candidates would make an effort to win our state … as it will not only increase voter turnout here, but it would make election night more interesting for all of us.
But I’ll stay skeptical and predict we won’t see much here.
So scratch off the chance of Hillary or Barack showing up at the Pottery Festival this year.

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Unrelated note … the below photo scares me, as there’s a chance it’s a photo of two U.S. presidents. Compare this one to the paintings of Washington and Lincoln, and I’d say there’s a bit of contrast.