post primary addendum

Shortly after I posted my most recent blog, McCain won Vermont, Texas, Ohio and Rhode Island and Mike Huckabee bowed out of the race, endorsing his former rival (as if he had a lot of choices).

Continuing the goodwill religiosity tour I started yesterday, let me posit that Jesus would be happy his children are getting along so well.

With all four March 4 contests under his belt, McCain has secured the nomination. Will he get the Catholics too? Apparently, Catholics are the new swing voters. Bush lost them to Gore, but won them against Kerry. My prediction? Though the Hagee endorsement won't sit too well with them, Catholics who voted for Bush will transfer nicely to McCain, as long as he remains pro-life. One thing is for sure, with endorsements from Huckabee and Hagee, McCain’s got the evangelicals locked up, or at least what’s left of the once powerful bloc.

The king-unmaker continues...as does punditry

Continuing the tradition I pointed out last week, Sen. John McCain unmade the kingdom of Mitt this week. After a poor showing on Super Tuesday, Romney suspended his campaign. The news bolstered the media, who have been calling McCain the Republican frontrunner as of late. I'm sure the pundits are pleased about being right this time, after sounding the death knell for his campaign last summer.

National Public Radio's "political junkie" Ken Rudin went so far as to compare the Senator to Ed Muskie! Sure, there are a lot of parallels between the 1972 race and this one, but now McCain looks a lot more like McGovern than anyone else.

But that's all behind us. And among those looking to the future are the top two Democratic candidates. McCain was mentioned in both Clinton and Obama's speeches following primaries in Louisiana, Nebraska, Washington state and the U.S. Virgin Islands this Saturday.

However, just because the media and the Democrats say "front runner" doesn't make it so. Voters in two southern states seem to disagree; it was not a particularly good weekend for McCain.

David Espo wrote for Associated Press that "McCain flunked his first ballot test since becoming the Republican nominee-in-waiting, losing the Kansas caucuses on Saturday to Mike Huckabee." That's heavy criticism from the usually bland AP. McCain also lost Louisiana to the former minister and only squeaked out a win in Washington state.

Up next are Maryland, Washington D.C. and Virginia on Feb. 12.

McCain still has almost 500 delegates over Huckabee, though, so his nomination is all but assured. However, that doesn't mean that he (or Huckabee) is going to slow down, that the news media will put down its collective crystal ball or that I'm going to stop watching.