Democratic primary voters in Ohio, Texas and Pennsylvania should take notice: Hillary Clinton intends to drag the party through the mud in order to regain the upper hand in her quickly fading bid to become its nominee for President.

It started moments after the polls closed on February 19, and the news channels projected Obama as the winner in Wisconsin and Hawaii. Clinton took to a stage in Youngstown, Ohio essentially parroting the talking points of GOP favorite John McCain.

The United States needs to elect a President who is capable of being “commander-in-chief in a dangerous world,” Clinton said. The Democratic Party needed to nominate a candidate whose support was based on “results, not speeches.”

Earlier in the night, McCain accused Obama of tricking the American people with an “eloquent, but empty call for change.” The two speeches were so similar in the first five minutes that I literally did a double-take to make sure I was listening to a candidate for the Democratic nomination, and not John McCain’s wife.

Later in the night, political news Web sites began to report about the controversial speaker who introduced Hillary Clinton at her Youngstown, Ohio rally following the primary results. Tom Buffenbarger, President of the International Association of Machinists, told a cheering crowd of Hillary supporters that he had “news for all the latte-drinking, Prius-driving, Birkenstock-wearing, trust fund babies crowding in to hear him speak … This guy won’t last a round against the Republican attack machine. He’s a poet, not a fighter.”

These lines closely mirrored a 2004 Club for Growth PAC, a far right-wing group, ad criticizing Howard Dean. “I think Howard Dean should take his tax-hiking, government-expanding, latte-drinking, sushi-eating, Volvo-driving, New York Times-reading…,” the ad said.

This was also similar to an introduction given by Bill Cunningham, a conservative radio host, at a McCain rally recently where he repeatedly invoked Obama’s middle name, Hussein, and called him a “hack, Chicago-style politician.”

Considering the amount of press time the Clinton campaign tried to get dedicated to the so-called “plagiarism” scandal, this rip-off is particularly amusing but also confusing.

News also broke shortly after the primary that wealthy Clinton supporters in Texas and Ohio were planning on forming a tax-exempt 527 group purposed with criticizing Obama’s credentials.

The American Leadership Project will be seeking pledges of $100,000 from donors in order to raise $10 million in order to deluge the two crucial primary states with negative ads which will no doubt reinforce Republican talking points about Obama as Clinton’s post-Wisconsin speech did.

This type of political advertising, which is designed to avoid federal regulations and resulted in groups like the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, is tricky and is likely to get smacked with several fines from the Federal Election Commission – but after the damage has been done to Obama and the Democratic Party, if he becomes the nominee.

Barack Obama and John Edwards, in December 2006, denounced any 527 activity on their behalf.

Clinton has also resorted to mocking Obama and his supporters. At a Monday rally in Ohio, Clinton derided Obama’s approach to politics, saying that he believes “The sky will open, the light will come down celestial choirs will be singing, and everyone will know that we should do the right thing and the world will be perfect.”

Mark Penn, Clinton’s pollster, has toured Sunday morning talk shows, to label states that Obama has won over the course of this campaign as irrelevant. First, he said, Obama’s victories didn’t matter because caucus states favor upper income voters (Iowa). Then, he said, Obama’s victories didn’t matter because they were in states that Democrats don’t normally factor into the electoral equation (South Carolina).

Then, he said, Obama’s victories didn’t matter because because he wasn’t winning traditional Democratic constituencies (Super Tuesday).

You get the picture.

These events are not isolated slip-ups. Reinforcing Republican talking points and importing Rove-style campaign tactics into the Democratic presidential primary race is the track that the Clinton campaign is headed down, hoping to rebound in the race.

Polls are increasingly undermining the hope of a Clinton resurgence. Clinton held a 13-point lead in Ohio on Feb. 20, according to SurveyUSA. She now only leads by two. Clinton held a 19-point lead in Texas on Feb. 19, according to Rasmussen Reports.

Every poll released in the last 72 hours shows Obama leading by an average of 3-5 points. Even in Pennsylvania, the only state where Clinton is outspending Obama, her lead has slipped from 22 points (Feb. 15) to 5 points (Feb. 27), according to Gallup.

Furthermore, virtually every poll shows Obama outperforming Clinton against McCain in a general election match-up. This is especially relevant in swing states, where polls show Obama besting McCain everywhere while McCain bests Clinton everywhere.

Of course, those leads will not hold up if Clinton decides to go nuclear on Barack Obama. If the last 10 days serve as a precursor to what we will see in the days leading up to the March 4 primaries, that is exactly what it appears she is ready to do. Clinton is writing speeches for the Republican Party.

Scott Harris is a UMass student.