Hillary Rodham Clinton crushed Barack Obama in the West Virginia primary yesterday — a victory that was surely personally satisfying but came as the Democratic presidential nomination is nearly in the grasp of her rival.

"There are some who have wanted to cut this race short," Clinton told raucous, cheering supporters in Charleston, but she left no doubt she plans to stay in the race through the final contests.

"I am more determined than ever to carry on this campaign until everyone has had a chance to make their voices heard," she said, calling herself a stronger candidate in a general election and a better-prepared president.

Obama, who had made just three campaign stops in West Virginia, was campaigning instead in Cape Girardeau, Mo. — a battleground state in the fall — and focusing on presumptive Republican nominee John McCain.

"There is a lot of talk these days about how the Democratic Party is divided," he said, "but I'm not worried because I know that we'll be able to come together quickly behind a common purpose."

Still, surveys of voters as they left polling places spotlighted Obama's difficulty in winning over white, working-class voters who have been a mainstay of Clinton's support and who dominate the Mountain State's electorate. She won white women by 3-1 and white men by 2-1. Whites without a college degree voted for her by 3-1.

Seven of 10 voters said Clinton shared their core values; fewer than half said that of Obama. Race was also a factor: One in five said it was important in their vote. Of those, 85 percent backed Clinton. Only a third of Clinton supporters said they would vote for Obama in November if he is nominated. Nearly as many said they would defect to McCain. A quarter said they'd stay home.

Obama's campaign distributed a strategy memo that downplayed the importance of West Virginia's 28 delegates, likely to split 19 for her, nine for him. Over the past week, the memo noted, Obama has been endorsed by 27 of the party leaders known as superdelegates. Before West Virginia's delegates were allocated, Obama was 150 delegates short of the 2,025 needed for nomination, an almost insurmountable lead.

Kentucky and Oregon hold primaries next Tuesday, followed by Puerto Rico on June 1 and the concluding contests in Montana and South Dakota on June 3.