Those were the questions that emerged from his defeat by Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton in the West Virginia Democratic primary on Tuesday, an electoral shellacking where more than half of the overwhelming white Democratic electorate said they would be unhappy if Mr. Obama was their presidential candidate this fall.

Mr. Obama’s advisers downplayed the West Virginia loss, describing the state as demographically unfriendly territory — the primary electorate was 95 percent white; 70 percent did not attend college — and pointing to national polls showing him in a strong position.