GOP rivals reverse roles

KALAMAZOO, Mich. — John McCain and Mike Huckabee traded places yesterday, with the war-hawk senator preaching Judeo-Christian values and the ordained Southern Baptist minister talking bullets and bombs at an armored-vehicle plant.

“We can’t leave people behind. That’s not America,” Mr. McCain said about laid-off workers in an impassioned speech to students and teachers at a Christian high school here. “We’re a Judeo-Christian values nation. We’re not going to leave these people behind.”

Mr. McCain, who won the New Hampshire primary last week and vaulted into the front-runner position for the Republican presidential nomination, has spent the last week trying to lock down independent voters, including evangelicals, who delivered a win to Mr. Huckabee in the Iowa caucuses two weeks ago.

Mr. Huckabee, the former Arkansas governor who was barely a blip on the Michigan state polls before his Iowa win, has climbed steadily and now stands solidly in third place, behind Mr. McCain and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, who are tied at the top.

Michigan votes today in the nation’s second primary.

Mr. Huckabee changed his schedule to campaign for several days in the state and, like Mr. McCain, is looking for momentum as the race shifts to South Carolina on Saturday.

Looking to swipe voters from Mr. McCain, Mr. Huckabee pitched national security and military strength yesterday during a stop in Lansing. With a huge armored truck as a backdrop, he said Michigan has long led the nation with “its capacity to build and manufacture our airplanes and our tanks and our armored vehicles, our bullets and our bombs.”

Deploying rhetoric usually used by Mr. McCain, the former governor said the U.S. cannot jeopardize its national security by becoming beholden to other nations for manufacturing needs.

“Every one of you in this plant truly represents something of significance, because you are reminding us that our ability to design and build our own weapons of self-defense is part of what keeps us free,” the minister told a group of steelworkers at Demmer Corp.

The day of trading roles illustrated the fervor with which the Republican presidential candidates are stumping for votes as they crisscross the state in a last-ditch effort to finish strong here. All three have traded barbs over jobs and the economy, and yesterday was no different as Mr. Huckabee took a swipe at Mr. Romney.

“It would be very difficult for him to explain to the rest of the country why the people who knew him best supported him least,” Mr. Huckabee said of Mr. Romney, who was born in Detroit and whose father, George W. Romney, was a popular Michigan governor in the 1960s.

Mr. Romney, who hoped to win both Iowa and New Hampshire but finished second in both while winning little-noticed Wyoming, said he wants a win in his home state.

“A second-place finish means I haven’t come in first, and that’s not what I want,” he said in answer to a question from The Washington Times. “I’m planning on coming in first in Michigan. I’ve got one gold and two silvers. Someone said the other day the pathway to the nomination may be paved with silver, but I’d still rather get gold here in Michigan.”

Yesterday’s campaigning in Michigan brought a surreal moment: All three candidates ended up at the International Auto Show in Detroit, with Mr. Huckabee’s entourage passing Mr. Romney’s press conference and Mr. McCain holding court in the atrium.

Across the state, the three candidates shifted their Iowa and New Hampshire messages to focus on the economy — unemployment here has skyrocketed to 7.4 percent, more than 50 percent higher than the rest of the nation, and voters here label the issue the most important to them.

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