Posted on 02/10/2008 2:25:41 AM PST by Catphish
WASHINGTON--Arizona Senator John McCain eked out a narrow victory in the Republican Party's caucuses in the northwestern state of Washington, the state party chairman announced late Saturday.
Former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee earlier Saturday defeated McCain in Republican presidential primaries in Louisiana and Kansas.
McCain, 71, a Vietnam war hero, is far ahead of his opponents in the delegate count and is the party's presumptive 2008 presidential standard bearer, though he faces opposition from core Republican conservatives.
With 87 percent of precincts reporting in Washington state, McCain led with 26 percent of the delegates, against 24 percent for Huckabee and 21 percent for Texas Congressman Ron Paul.
Former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney, who earlier dropped out of the race without announcing an endorsement, won 17 percent.
Nearly 13 percent of delegates reported their preference as "uncommitted," while another 1.1 percent reported their preference as "other," Washington state Party Chairman Luke Esser said in a statement.
Nope, and hopefully it's beginning to dawn on the electorate what a worthless excuse for a presidential candidate McCain is. Many thanks to the STUPID Republican party leadership who scheduled the primaries to allow independents and Democrats could vote so early in the season and give this foolish old man a big head start.
Yes, John! And be sure to keep telling us how conservative you are! There just may be enough people willing to swallow that bilge.
Add to that the fact that (at least at my caucus) there was no discussion of the candidates, no "bending of ears" and "twisting of arms" to get people to support one candidate or another. It wasn't allowed. People wrote down their preference upon coming into the room (I think this is what is being reported as the caucus result) and then people volunteered to be delegates to the county caucus and then we left. No debate was allowed.
Other caucuses around the state did debate and discuss, FWIW, but in the end, this caucus result is tainted. It is crap.
Yes, John! And be sure to keep telling us how conservative you are! There just may be enough people willing to swallow that bilge.
I was hoping for a victory speech in which he beat his chest on this big victory, and congratulated Huckabee on his two victories and thanked Senator Brownback for his endorsement in Kansas which helped him close to within 36 points of Huckabee. Brownback is a Republican Senator and probably fancies himself as some kind of party leader. Well, he is a laughingstock as are most Republican Senators and wannabe party leaders. How out of touch can somebody be, to use what he thinks is his political influence to endorse the presumptive nominee, and the guy gets hammered by 60-24 margin. Maybe Brownback's endorsement was absolultely worthless, but if Brownback does not give McCain the endorsement does that mean McCain gets hammered even worse? Political records are not kept on such things, but I doubt if a sitting Senator has ever endorsed the presumptive nominee in his home state and been so rebuked or humiliated.
My right to vote for the candidate of my choice in the primary was stolen from me by the Party’s big bosses.Living in Ohio has some drawbacks.
His age and health issues make his VP choice VERY important. If he picks a true conservative, I might just change my mind about voting for him. If not, I will go 3rd party.
I don’t know how they are counting the delegates that are going to the convention as undecided. The majority of the votes at our caucus were undecided because they felt that they did not have a choice.
I’ll bet Governor Christine could tell you.
Michael Frazier
But regardless of all this bickering about will we or won’t we vote for McCain may be pointless. Remember Bush was very popular among Republicans his first run at office and he won by the skin of his teeth, remember the hanging chads?, and during his 2nd run still with a favorable rating he still squeaked by, does the Ohio recount come to mind? So with McCain with such poor ratings among Republicans how could he possibly win in November?
So do the 13% of precincts that have not been counted and were still to be counted when the vote counting stopped over 13 hours ago (see Washington GOP) include the homeless in downtown Seattle whose address is the county courthouse and whose vote helped put Governor Christine into office on the third recount in her election? </sarcasm>
Wow, Ron Paul got 21% ?!
I find that pretty astounding. I’m not a Ronulan, but having to choose between McCain and Huckabee, I can understand why some went for Paul.
Ron Paul doing well in Washington makes sense. They are mad over at the forums that he did not win. They think the results and counting was suspended because he was going win it and the establishment claimed McCain the winner. If I were to pick a state or two he would do well in they would be Oregon and Washington.
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