The math is simple; Vote(Huck) == Vote(McCain)

I usually don’t promote my own blog, but since it’s one of my guest-bloggers who wrote the post, I’m less-reluctant. Shoebox broke out the joke about two guys and the bear to describe what happened. Guess who put on the running shoes to outrun the other guy?

Kindly note: I’m not advocating the McCain/Huckadoom strategy, just acknowledging that it will screw my preferred candidate, Mitt Romney.

I personally believe he’s promised something to Huckabee in order for them to collude in this manner. I’ll read the Michael Bates strategy, but I too believe it will not work to help Huckabee win…only to further doom Romney.

Its a classic ‘Ross Perot’ screw strategy, Huckabee being the ‘Perot’ in the mix here.

Numbers USA, the anti-amnesty group, sent an e-mail out to their supporters urging a vote for Huckabee in AL, AR, MO, OK, and TN, and a vote for Romney most everywhere else, in order to stop McCain.

In Oklahoma, Huckabee has a solid core of about 30%. Romney was in single digits here until two weeks ago. I just don’t see Romney pulling enough of Huckabee’s support away to beat both him and McCain. I think the same is true in the other Southern states. Huckabee seems to connect with both traditional Southern Baptists — practically the established religion down here — and with suburban megachurch types in a way that Romney doesn’t.

Also, I wouldn’t assume too much influence by the presidential campaigns over the West Virginia results. The people doing the voting were party activists — elected officials, executive committee members, and people who ran for election as state delegates. Half of them were uncommitted going into the convention.

Michael…

I don’t understand.

Wouldn’t the ‘best way’ to deny McCain a victory, be for Huckabee to tell all delegates to support Romney, then endorse him and withdraw from the race???

If he truly wants to deny McCain the win, that seems the best way to do it. Huckabee has 1/3 of the delegates nationally to Romney.…why not jump on his ticket?

Huckabee doesn’t have any control over his delegates. If he withdraws from the race, they are free agents.

Also, Romney doesn’t have as many delegates as you might think. The Iowa, Maine, and Nevada “results” were only straw polls, and the affiliations of the delegates who will be eventually elected by those states, in June, May, and April, respectively, will almost certainly bear no resemblance to the straw poll outcomes. For example, Nevada’s state convention will probably elect a full slate of Romney supporters to the national convention, assuming he’s still in the race. If, say, Huckabee’s supporters in Iowa left their caucuses after the straw poll and didn’t stay to vote for county delegates, Huckabee may not do as well at the next step.

My count, based solely on national delegates who are formally bound or who announced their preference when they were elected, has McCain 86, Romney 32, Huckabee 31, plus 4 who were elected promising to support candidates who have since withdrawn (Thompson and Hunter). Those numbers include W. Va. Romney’s total includes 8 delegates from Wyoming who are actually free to vote for anyone they please, but they said they were Romney supporters when they ran to be national delegates.