Al Gore and John Kerry claimed victory in a couple of fairly recent Presidential elections too.
Neither of them ever sat in the big chair though.
This story is probably closer to the truth...
http://www.texastribune.org/stories/2010/jan/15/debate-not-exactly-game-changer/#ixzz0ciau855J
Not Exactly a Game-Changer
In the first debate of this political season, Gov. Rick Perry didn’t fall on his face. U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison didn’t, either. Each worked in the kinds of lines that please supporters without creating many new ones, but neither landed a knockout punch. For a politician with a reputation to protect, that’s the description of a win.
If the third candidate on the Denton stage didn’t win some new fans, or votes, Debra Medina at least held her own in her first and perhaps only debate with the two Republican heavyweights. Medina cast Hutchison and Perry as insiders in federal and state governments that aren’t working right for average Texans, touted her proposal for ending property and business margin taxes (to be replaced by higher sales taxes she thinks would be more fair), blasted their immigration policies. We even learned she doesn’t pack a gun when she’s in the grocery store, where it’s illegal.
Each of the three claimed victory. The real winner, probably, was Medina, who doesn’t have the money to advertise statewide or to travel as broadly and quickly as the other two Republicans in the race. Thursday night was her best chance yet to get in front of voters, and she hung in with the two more experienced professional pols.
She, like Hutchison, directed her fire at Perry, who was forced to defend himself on eminent domain and transportation, on budgets and taxes, and even on the economy he’s been touting as his biggest achievement as the state’s top elected official since 2000.
Perry didn’t shoot much at Medina, but goaded Hutchison about her votes for rising federal spending and deficits, for her support for abortion rights secured by the Supreme Court’s Roe v. Wade decision, and for being a creature of Washington (an attack echoed in an ad campaign he started on the day of the debates).
Read more: http://www.texastribune.org/stories/2010/jan/15/debate-not-exactly-game-changer/#ixzz0ciau855J
Medina will be lucky to get 10% of the vote....she can declare herself Jesus Christ superstar....but the facts remain except for a small minority no one cares what she declares!