In spite of John McCain's long list of high profile endorsements, he wasn't able to secure the Republican nomination on Tuesday.
All the king's horses and all the king's men...
From the Washington Post:
Sen. John McCain surged closer toward the Republican nomination yesterday by capturing the biggest Super Tuesday states, including California, but failed to knock out his rivals, who deprived him of victories across GOP strongholds in the South and West.
As millions of Republicans went to the polls in 21 states, the senator from Arizona racked up hundreds of delegates on the strength of winner-take-all primaries in the Northeast and elsewhere. But his inability to win in more than half of the states voting yesterday complicated his hopes of rallying the party behind his candidacy.
Former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee scored a surprising sweep of his native South, while former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney picked up a number of states in the West but fell short in critical battlegrounds that would have established him as McCain's primary challenger. Huckabee and Romney vowed last night to stay in the race as it moves to Virginia, Maryland and the District on Tuesday.
The multiple-front clash represented a virtual national primary as Republicans voted to choose a standard-bearer, with more states voting at once than in any other GOP nomination battle.
...McCain, a former prisoner of war in Vietnam who has carved out a career as a blunt-talking maverick on Capitol Hill, moved closer to the presidential prize he has been seeking for more than a decade by earning support across the country. But the voting made clear that serious challenges remain for McCain: to clear the field of rivals who question his commitment to conservative ideology, and to consolidate a fractured party.
During their coverage of the primaries and caucuses, the media dwelled on what a bad night Romney had.
In my opinion, McCain was the big loser.
He was supposed to seal the deal on Tuesday. He didn't. He failed. He lost.
Yes, he's the front-runner, but he's not the definitive choice. Republicans did not choose their nominee yesterday.
Do I think he'll be the nominee eventually? Yes.
Do I think he can count on the unwavering support of his party? Not at all.
Of course, McCain does have reason to celebrate capturing the big states. He had his victories, no doubt about it.
But McCain didn't accomplish the two things he set out to do -- get rid of Romney and convince voters that he's a conservative.
McCain failed to eliminate his competition and he failed to win over conservatives.
Romney and Huckabee together kept at least 11 states out of McCain's column, and each claimed to be the alternative to the front-runner, who struggled throughout the day to appeal to conservatives. "Over the past few days, a lot of people have been saying this is a two-man race," Huckabee told supporters last night in Little Rock. "And you know what? It is. And we're in it."
Huckabee did well in the South. He managed to regain some relevance.
As far as his claim that it's now a race between him and McCain, someone should tell him that he's in third place right now.
And let's drop the pretense that McCain and Huckabee have no alliance. Huckabee is preparing to fill the VP spot on the ticket.
...Speaking before the results in California had come in, Romney told supporters in Boston that "the one thing that is clear is that this campaign is going on." He said that "there are some people who thought it was all going to be done tonight," but he pledged to "go all the way to the convention, and we're going to win this thing."
The pundits and the media huffed and they puffed but they didn't blow Mitt down.
...Among self-described conservatives voting yesterday, exit polling showed that McCain lost to Romney or Huckabee in many states, a sign that the anger and mistrust vented on talk shows in recent days is shared by many of the party faithful. In California, Romney held a double-digit lead over McCain among conservative voters. Romney even won conservative voters in McCain's home state of Arizona.
Talk radio is not the source of voters' anger and mistrust for McCain.
McCain's record is the source. McCain's stance on the issues is the source. McCain's betrayal of conservative principles is the source.
I don't like that telling these truths is described as "venting."
Bottom line: John McCain doesn't have a chance of winning if he doesn't unite the party. I don't see that happening because I don't think that John McCain is going to reach out to conservatives. His idea of reaching out to them is by claiming to be one of them. At least on a number of issues, that, of course, is absurd.
The short-term future may look bright for McCain. Looking toward November, things get awfully dark.
From that perspective, it's hard to see McCain as Super Tuesday's big winner.
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