Washington Update
Nathan Greene
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According to local press reports, the Washington state GOP is now saying they’ve got their numbers right, and McCain is still the winner. (Of course, I’m still not seeing any raw numbers, only percentages reported). There were four counties which had given the state party wrong numbers. There are still four counties yet to be counted. Now the question is, do you trust the results?
The story the local GOP officials are trying to spin now is that the results of the straw poll taken on caucus night really don’t mean much since delegates are free to change their minds and support whomever they want later on in the convention process. Sounds similar to the way we do it here in Iowa, but ask the campaigns whether the felt our straw poll results were important. I’m guessing they would say YES!
I think Huckabee had every right to question these results, and he still does. Why not allow campaigns more access to monitor the process? What’s up with the voting irregularities reported? Why the huge delay in tallying the totals? And why the “projection” of a winner made by the state party chairman (using completely unscientific calculations) when there is 240 votes separating the leaders and 1,500 votes yet to count?
And then you’ve got statements like this, from former GOP Chairman Chris Vance:
"What happens before now and the state convention -- there's no way to know," Vance said. "The Huckabee campaign either doesn't understand that, which I doubt, or they're just trying to use this to build up sympathy for poor Mike Huckabee who's being persecuted by the Republican establishment in Washington state."
Hmmm. Sounds like a really great, impartial, and fair person. At least he’s not party chairman anymore, but who knows how much of his staff and influence remain. Note to Chris: Don’t blame the Huckabee campaign because your state party is, how do I say this nicely, either completely incompetent (best case scenario) or completely corrupt (worst case scenario).
There are still a lot of unanswered questions here. Let’s hope the WA GOP has the integrity to come clean and explain themselves.
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