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ELECTION 2008: No one scores Super knockout

McCain on top, but Huckabee wins hit Romney

BY TOM BRUNE | tom.brune@newsday.com

February 6, 2008

WASHINGTON - With the biggest wins in the 21-state mega-primary yesterday, John McCain began to pull away from chief rival Mitt Romney and moved toward clinching the nomination.

With late projections of victories in the delegate-laden states of California, Missouri and New York, McCain put himself in position to win the delegates necessary to collect the 1,191 to become the GOP nominee.

But he still has Romney at his heels and a buoyant Mike Huckabee, who stunned many by routing Romney in the South, staying alive in the race, at least for now.

"We still have a ways to go, but we're much closer to the victory we have worked so hard to achieve. And I am confident we will get there," McCain said in Phoenix to cheers before California had been decided.

He noted that his mother turns 96 tomorrow and that he is "superstitious" about making predictions, but he said, "I think it's fair to say it has come a little closer to the time when mothers in Arizona might be able to tell their children they can grow up to be president of the United States."

McCain also offered his congratulations to Huckabee, who won with little money, and Romney, who sunk $35 million of his own money into his race, and promised to work at unifying the party.

Huckabee split the conservative vote with Romney, and beat him in the South, with returns showing he won Alabama, Georgia, Tennessee, West Virginia and his home state of Arkansas.

Romney scored victories in his home states of Utah and Massachusetts, and won Colorado and the caucus states of Montana, North Dakota and Minnesota.

But the true race is not the number of states but the number of delegates, and the first to 1,191 wins the nomination.

With delegates awarded to winners of congressional districts in some states and proportionately among candidates in others, an exact delegate count was not available. But CNN projected McCain won 475 delegates yesterday, far more than Huckabee or Romney.

McCain won four winner-take-all states with as many as 201 delegates that were formerly expected to be Rudy Giuliani wins: New York, New Jersey, Connecticut and Delaware. He also won Illinois, Oklahoma and his home state of Arizona.

Romney and Huckabee appeared after 10 p.m. to say that they would continue their campaigns.

Romney, who had only won his home states of Utah and Massachusetts when he spoke, said his wife told him, "The one thing that is clear tonight is that nothing is clear."

He paused. "But I think she's wrong," Romney said at his headquarters in Boston. "One thing is clear tonight. This campaign is going on."

Huckabee was more buoyant and excited, having won three states when he was projected only to win Arkansas.

"Over the past few days a lot of people have been trying to say that this is a two-man race," Huckabee said in Little Rock. "Well, you know what? It is! And we're in it."

He added, "We're a little further down the road after tonight, but we're still not going to have a nominee."

Results and exit polls that came in last night painted a picture of a still-fractured Republican Party, with conservatives turning largely to Romney or Huckabee, and moderates and national-security voters going for McCain.

But the massive conservative backlash that Romney and some of his supporters had hoped would derail McCain may have slowed him down but left him on track.

McCain was hit by some last-minute harsh attacks.