Tuesday, March 07, 2000
Ohio may foreshadow GOP nomination
Dem race has less suspense
BY WALTER R. MEARS
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON — George W. Bush's fortunes in Ohio and New England could be early signs to foretell whether Super Tuesday voting from Maine to California will deliver him the Republican presidential nomination or force him into another round with John McCain.
For Democrats, there is less suspense. Only a miracle of upsets, beginning from the first votes counted, can keep Al Gore from effectively sealing that nomination. And Bill Bradley doesn't really expect that, for all his talk of a Harry Truman-style reversal for his waning campaign.
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There are 11 presidential primaries, caucuses elsewhere, and decisions in 16 states.
The first of the big three Super Tuesday states to return its verdict is Ohio, where the polls close at 7:30 p.m.
California is crucial today, as it may be again on Nov. 7, when the next president is chosen.
The 162 Republican delegates that will be committed to the GOP winner there represent 16 percent of the votes needed to win the nomination. Polls rate Gov. Bush well ahead of Sen. McCain among Republican voters there.
There is a separate, all-candidates preference vote, and that is closer. Winning it will be a talking point, and an argument for electability there in the fall — but with no reward in nominating delegates, the contest that counts now. The positioning primaries are over; Super Tuesday is about hard numbers, not momentum or doing well or any of the other catchwords of the earlier campaign season.
“So much of this is an expectations game,” Mr. McCain said. But that game is over. Mr. Bush said the attention on Wednesday morning will focus on the number of nominating votes each candidate won. Mr. Gore had 482 Democratic delegates in his column going in, Mr. Bradley 57. It will take 2,170 to win that nomination. Mr. Bush has 170 GOP delegates, Mr. McCain 105, with 1,034 needed to nominate.
Neither leader can mathematically clinch the nomination today. There aren't enough delegates. But either or both could settle the contest by winning enough states and delegates to force his rival to quit.
Democrats assign their delegates in proportion to popular votes, by state or district, so Mr. Bradley will claim a share even in a Gore sweep of the 15 Democratic contests today.
“I do think we have to win a couple of states,” Mr. Bradley said, a forlorn assessment of the outlook for a challenger who once loomed as a real threat to Mr. Gore. Unless the couple of states were to be upsets in California and New York, Mr. Bradley's next step is probably out of the campaign.
The Super Tuesday delegates represent about 60 percent of a nominating majority in each party.
While that is the number to watch, counting it up will go far into election night and the early morning hours on Wednesday. The California polls are open until 11 p.m. Eastern time, and three Western caucus states begin reporting at midnight.
“There has not been a primary yet that's met expectations,” Mr. McCain said. “It's just too volatile.”
New York offers the second richest lode of delegate votes, 243 to be apportioned between Mr. Gore and Mr. Bradley based on their popular vote; 101 in a more complex Republican primary that will take longer to count after the polls close. The Republican primary is really 31 separate contests, in each congressional district, without a statewide contest. Delegates are the big names on the ballot.
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