First Super Tuesday result — Huckabee takes W.Va.

February 5, 2008

Of the 43 contests held today, 42 are either primaries or caucuses. The exception is West Virginia’s Republican state convention, which met this afternoon. And the first winner of a Super Tuesday contest is … Mike Huckabee, who picked up all of West Virginia’s 18 delegates today.

Huckabee bested Mitt Romney, who entered the Mountain State event with the largest bloc of pledged convention-goers. Both men and Ron Paul made in-person appeals to the more than 1,100 convention delegates attending Tuesday’s convention.

But the former Arkansas governor beat his Massachusetts counterpart after delegates for John McCain defected to his side.

The first round of voting at the state convention produced no winner, but eliminated Paul after his fourth-place finish.

This is Huckabee’s first victory anywhere since his win in Iowa just over a month ago, and is something of a setback for Romney, who actually campaigned in West Virginia and was generally expected to come out on top today.

Indeed, Romney was well ahead on the first ballot, which showed him leading the field with 41%, followed by Huckabee at 33%, John McCain at 16%, and Ron Paul at 10%. On the second ballot, though, which narrowed the race to the top two, Huckabee picked up the bulk of the other candidates’ supporters, and beat Romney, 52% to 47%.

As Eric Kleefeld noted, “Not only do the other candidates dislike Romney — their supporters all hate him, too.”

And in case you’re wondering — I was — about how West Virginia’s process works, it’s apparently pretty complicated. Painfully so. Jonathan Martin explained.

My colleague Lisa Lerer offers this dispatch from Charleston, W.Va: “This has been the slow drill school of dentistry.”

That’s how John McCutcheon, Mitt Romney’s senior adviser in West Virginia, describes the state’s brand-new presidential convention process.

The analogy might be painful, but the point is well-taken: West Virginia’s convention process makes the Iowa caucus look easy. […]

Over the past few months, counties held staggered elections to pick 1,207 delegates to send to the state convention.

Someday, every state will just host a nice, normal primary. Until then, this is all very silly.

As for the bigger picture, Huckabee hoped not to get shut out on Super Tuesday, and he’s already got one win under his belt. (Whether it’s his only win remains to be seen.) If he’s looking for a rationale to keep fighting, a victory or two ought to do the trick.

“As for the bigger picture, Huckabee hoped not to get shout out on Super Tuesday,”

Did you mean “get shut out””

Then again, “Huckabee hoped to get a shout out on Super Tuesday” sounds kind of funny.

  • A system that actually lets voters pick their second choice if there is no majority in the first round of voting.

    And we have a problem with it why?

    Congradulations Mike Huckabee. I’ll be hiding under my bed now.

  • Go for Third Party, Huck!
    Call it the “Old Time Religion Republican Party.”

    Psst Steve – “…Huckabee hoped not to get SHUT out..”

    Or maybe it was a shout out to Rush & Dobson.

  • Way to go Suckabee. Let’s disenfranchise the Conservative vote so Billary can kick the mess out of the GOP in November!!!! Look for Suckabee to be Cain’s lapdog running mate. Also look for the GOP to suffer a HUGE loss at whoever the Democratic nominee is. Way to alienate the base guys. If the GOP abandons conservatives, expect conservatives to abandon the GOP. This TRUE conservative will be voting for whoever the Democrats nominate if McCain is our nominee. If I’ve GOT to vote for a liberal, it may as well be one who is honest about who and what they are.

    If you can’t win it honestly… just take the shortcut; it’s the McCain way. Expect to see these kind of Washington insider crooked political tactics for the rest of the primaries. Way to show the world that Republicans really ARE crooks

  • Mike Huckabee probably has a wide appeal to the evangelicals who are not interested in oppressing the poor and giving all the tax breaks to the wealthy. Perhaps the evangelicals are as tired as the rest of us of trying to make a dollar out of fifty cents. Personally I think Dobson and Rush are irrelevant to most people and probably don’t carry the weight they carried before W destroyed this country. It is time for a big change and I would think even the republicans know that it is time.

  • I actually feel sorry for Republicans like Stephen @ #4, searching everywhere for a “true conservative,” but never quite finding him. No one ever seems to measure up. Cue the namecalling – Suckabee, Billary etc.

    I read comments like this all the time on the website of our local newspaper – people telling us “Vote for A – he’s a ‘true conservative.'”

    “No he isn’t – B is a true conservative.”

    And so on.

    Sometimes we liberals are just as bad. “I won’t vote for X if he/she is nominated. X is just as bad as the Republicans.” Like Al Gore was as bad as Bush, so it only made sense to vote for Nader.

    The WV convention may be confusing, but I like the idea of getting to express a second choice if my first choice is eliminated. If the fifty states can ever figure out how to count first place votes with reasonable accuracy, perhaps we could consider this in the future. But for now, it’s obvious that Americans aren’t smart enough to make something like this work.

  • If this is an example of the way Mr. McCain intends to “…reach across the aisle”, he won’t get my respect or my vote. This is old-school, smoke-filled, back-room, dirty-dealing politics that tells me quite a lot about Mr. McCain’s character.

  • “This has been the slow drill school of dentistry”

    – Insert joke about West Virginians having one tooth here –

    “Over the past few months, counties held staggered elections to pick 1,207 delegates to send to the state convention.”

    – Insert insulting joke about West Virginians’ IQ here –

  • I can’t understand all the screams of NO FAIR re: McCain. This was a GOP system put in place by the GOP.

    Oh I forgot, Republicans aren’t responsible for the consequences of their actions.

    ____

    psst! As for the bigger picture, Huckabee hoped not to get shut out on Super Tuesday

    The Stealth Editor strikes again!

  • Well, proof of what pretty much everybody thought – Huckabee made a deal and will be the VP candidate. Surprised he took McCain, but whadya gonna do?

  • At first, I regarded the possibility of the Holy Huckster as running mate with the sort of distaste normally reserved for slimy crawling things – however, it could have an upside. The combination of Huckabee and John McCain (Romney is spiraling earthward, trailing black smoke) could be just what the Democrats need to make moderate Republicans recoil in horror.

    I don’t see any chance of a similar matchup resulting in a Clinton/Obama ticket, mostly because I think Hillary is going to lose, and that Obama will pick John Edwards. That combination truly would cover the waterfront.

  • The Convention system is how Canadian political parties – both Federal & Provincial – pick their leaders.

    It can be quite dramatic,
    especially with lots of candidates.

    After each round of voting there is the speculation of who will support who – the conferences in the hallways – the decision – the defeated candidate crossing the hall – the cheering supporters – the glum faces of the supporters of the remaining candidates.

  • Dear Ohioan,

    Watch how you talk about West Virginians. I know where to find you.

    Signed. Anonymous.

  • […] the former Arkansas governor beat his Massachusetts counterpart after delegates for John McCain defected to his side.

    Oy! Lieberman will be soooo disappointed if McCain picks Huckabe as his running mate. I bet he was counting on a “Indomitable Grandfathers” ticket…

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