Riverwood Presbyterian Church

Politics

And Then There Were Two (kinda)

by Clay Staggs

Since my last entry on the topic, the presidential race has seen the departure of both John Edwards and Rudy Guliaini. The former is really no surprise; the latter, however, had been the candidate I thought would carry the day on the Republican side. Politics is strange and unpredictable.

Speaking of strange and unpredictable, the man with the momentum on the GOP side now appears to be McCain. I will confess that I never in a million years would have expected him to be nominatable, since he really hasn’t been a very good Republican for the last 10 years or so. But, following Romney’s loss to McCain in Florida, Romney faces an uphill battle to pull it out. The reason is that, even though it looks like a two man race, it really isn’t.

Huckabee remains in the race, and his supporters, mostly evangelicals, hold Romney’s fate in their hands. One would expect that evangelicals would be most indisposed toward McCain. Their signature issue, abortion, might suffer with McCain making nominations to the US Supreme Court. Recently, McCain has been quoted (though he disputes this) as saying that Justice Alito (widely thought to be anti-Roe) was too conservative for his tastes in a nominee. From Bob Novak:

“In fact, multiple sources confirm that the senator made negative comments about Alito nine months ago. …

“I found what McCain could not remember: a private, informal chat with conservative Republican lawyers shortly after he announced his candidacy in April 2007. I talked to two lawyers who were present whom I have known for years and who have never misled me. One is neutral in the presidential race, and the other recently endorsed Mitt Romney. Both said they were not Fund’s source, and neither knew I was talking to the other. They gave me nearly identical accounts, as follows:

“‘Wouldn’t it be great if you get a chance to name somebody like Roberts and Alito?’ one lawyer commented. McCain replied, ‘Well, certainly Roberts.’ Jaws were described as dropping. My sources cannot remember exactly what McCain said next, but their recollection is that he described Alito as too conservative.”

Wow. So here’s the calculus for evangelicals (that means us - Alabama votes Tuesday, and is predicted by all polling to be going for Huckabee): Huckabee cannot win, but is in the race still. With Rudy’s departure, moderates have one candiate in the race. Conservatives have two - Romney, who could still win, and Huckabee, who can’t. Should conservatives abandon Huckabee for Romney, then it’s a real fight that could stretch into April and May. If they stick with Hucakbee, they effectively insure the nomination of McCain. It will be interesting to see what develops.

For the politico-nerds like me, some interesting calculations about the delegate count can be found here. The long and short of it is that McCain will only be about halfway to the delegates needed to win the nomination after Tuesday, assuming current polling is accurate.

Now, if the Republican race looks interesting, it pales beside the dems. The Clinton machine versus the politics of hope. My money’s on the machine, but with Teddy Kennedy endorsing Obama, who knows anymore?

On to Super Tuesday……