The fast-approaching wave of primaries and caucuses look good for John McCain, riding high on his Saturday victory in South Carolina despite doubts about whether he can grab the gold in the end.
Republican campaign professionals agree that Mr. McCain’s three-percentage-point win Saturday over former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee gives the Arizona senator a boost, for now.
“Even with McCain’s South Carolina win, the Republican race is still a battle among Mitt Romney, McCain, Mike Huckabee and Rudy Giuliani,” said Maryland Republican Chairman James Pelura. “The next few weeks will be very telling.”
The question among Republicans is whether Mr. McCain can win pluralities or majorities within his party in the coming contests or whether he have to continue to rely on independents to put him over the top.
Mr. McCain heads into the Jan. 29 Florida primary having relied on independents for his wins in New Hampshire and South Carolina. He did not win a majority of Republican voters in either contest.
“The simple formula is that independents equal McCain and just Republicans does not equal McCain,” said David Paleologos, director of the Suffolk University Political Research Center. “It’s four-man race, conditional on Rudy Giuliani finishing no more than five percentage points behind the winner in Florida.
“Otherwise, it’s a three-man race among McCain, Romney and Huckabee, who still has enough Southern states yet to vote to be competitive,” he said.
Mr. McCain and Mr. Huckabee split the vote of self-described Republicans, but the senator outdid the former governor by 42 percent to 25 percent among independents, who made up almost 20 percent of the Republican vote in South Carolina, according to exit polling.
A week after Florida, 21 states — some of them the most populous such as California (173 delegates) and New York (101 delegates) — also hold Republican contests.
The possible key on Feb. 5 is that independents or Democrats can vote in at least 12 of those Republican presidential preference contests, which carry a total of 564 delegates — more than half the 1,081 Republican delegates to be fought over in the 21 state contests.
Democrats are holding their own presidential delegate elections in all but two of those states. There are also Democratic contests in three other states that day.
The candidate who gets 1,191 delegates before or during the Republican National Convention in September wins the nomination.
That’s the potential advantage for Mr. McCain, although many analysts think Mr. Romney has the best across-the-board message for Republican rank and file and for most conservatives.
“But McCain has the advantage, and it is in media momentum he now has,” said John McLaughlin, Fred Thompson’s campaign pollster. “None of the candidates can afford to buy media in most of the February 5 states. Florida will be the last state where paid advertising by candidates will actually have an impact.”
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