McCain, Huckabee and Some 'Evangelicals'

Robert Novak / SignOn San Diego:
John McCain, who has spent the last two months trying to consolidate right-wing support as the Republican candidate for president, has a problem of disputed dimensions with a vital component of the conservative coalition: the evangelicals. The biggest question is whether Mike Huckabee is part of the problem or the solution for McCain. An element of the Christian community is not reconciled to McCain's candidacy but instead regards the prospective presidency of Barack Obama in the nature of a biblical plague visited upon a sinful people. These militants look at former Baptist preacher Huckabee as "God's candidate" running for president in 2012. Whether they can be written off as merely a troublesome fringe group depends on Huckabee's course.

Related:
McCain Still Failing To Close With GOP Voters
Peter Dreier / Huffington Post
"McCain Can't Close the Deal." If the mainstream media were truly being evenhanded, that's the headline that would appear in newspapers and news magazines around the country. Why? Because even after he became the presumptive Republican presidential candidate on March 4 -- when Ohio, Texas, Vermont, and Rhode Island held their primaries and Mike Huckabee dropped out -- McCain can't seem to rally GOP voters behind him. In the past two months, despite McCain's status as the designated nominee, GOP primary voters have delivered significant protest votes to Huckabee and Ron Paul (who has made few campaign appearances), as well as other candidates who ended their campaigns long ago. In states as different as Mississippi, Pennsylvania, Indiana, and North Carolina, McCain only attracted between 73% and 79% of primary voters -- hardly the groundswell one would expect once the field had been cleared.

Posted by Editor at May 13, 2008 08:44 AM