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Some final thoughts from Virginia’s presidential primary:

* All night long, we’ve been looking at McCain’s relatively weak showing against Huckabee. But as the final numbers come in, McCain has edged, once again, over 50 percent. And he’s winning with about 55 percent of the vote in Maryland right now. So I wonder, come the morning, how much his relatively unimpressive Virginia margin is going to matter? (It won’t matter on the delegate count; the Old Dominion is winner-take-all on the GOP side). University of Virginia political analyst Larry Sabato says it’ll matter a lot to Republican insiders; he says some worry that in McCain they’re nominating another Bob Dole. We’ll see. Democratic strategist Paul Goldman thinks this was Huckabee’s Gettysburg.

* By the same token, how much will Obama’s margins start to matter in the opposite direction? The Clinton people had been downplaying Virginia, saying, well, that’s an Obama state. Maybe so, but that’s quite a landslide for Obama. If you had told me a month ago that Clinton would have gotten wiped out in Northern Virginia and been reduced to relying on Southwest Virginia, I’d have thought you were crazy. For two candidates who have been evenly matched nationally, this 64-35 split is a pretty stunning margin. Obama has now won eight states in a row, and by some pretty thunderous margins. See the earlier post with the Paul Goldman quote about how Texas could be Clinton’s Alamo. I’m betting we might see a lot of pundits using that line in the days ahead.

* What does the turn-out mean? More than 900,000 people -- maybe close to 1 million -- have voted in the Democratic primary. That’s about 20 percent turn-out. By contrast, the turnout in the Democratic primary in 2004 was only 9 percent. You can go back to the first big Super Tuesday primary in 1988, and even then the turnout was only 14 percent on the Democratic side. So this is a quantum leap for the Democrats.

On the Republican side, umm, not so much. Looks like about 450,000 or so have voted, or just under 10 percent. That’s down from 17 percent in the 2000 primary where George W. Bush defeated John McCain. Interestingly, that year Bush took almost 53 percent of the vote and that was considered a pretty decisive win. So if McCain winds up close to that, maybe his total isn’t as bad as some have feared.

There’s certainly no doubt that this year’s primary has put Virginia on the map, not just nationally, but even internationally. My 12-year-old son just called in from Bolivia to get an update on the results, which he says he’ll announce at his school tomorrow (he’s there on an exchange trip).

The candidates are now off to the next round of states -- Wisconsin and Hawaii, then Texas and Ohio on March 4. I wonder if we’ll see any of them around these parts again in the fall?

-- Dwayne Yancey, Senior Editor

Roanoke has spoken, and the winners in the Star City are Obama and Huckabee.
Results first, analysis second.

Democrats:
Obama 5,998
Clinton 4,402

Republicans:
Huckabee 2,394
McCain 1,397

Here’s what I notice in looking at the returns on a precinct level. Clinton carried the two places I had identified as swing areas -- she took four of the six Williamson Road precincts (older, less affluent) and four of the five Raleigh Court precincts (middle-class areas, for those not familiar with the city). And, she won in some of the Southeast precincts (blue-collar neighborhoods). So how did she lose overall then? She lost because Obama stayed close in many of those precincts. And then he won by thunderous margins in the African-American precincts (example: Eureka Park, where Obama won 425 to 63.) He also won the two South Roanoke precincts, perhaps the city’s most affluent precincts by a total of 486-275. That profile pretty well matches how things have gone nationally.

The Republican side is a lot simpler tonight. Huckabee won all by two of the city’s precincts. He lost only in South Roanoke #1 and South Roanoke #2.

-- Dwayne Yancey, Senior Editor

Here's another interesting -- and potentially important -- tidbit from today's tally:

Obama got more votes than all the Republicans combined. I'd like to claim credit for spotting that, but it really comes from the campaign of Tom Perriello, the Democrat who would like to run against Rep. Virgil Goode, R-Rocky Mount, this fall.

With 91 percent of the vote counted, Obama has 508,098 votes. All the Republicans together have 397,304. I'm sure Democrats (especially Obama Democrats) will talk that up as more evidence that Virginia is turning into a "purple" state that could fall into the Democrats' column in the fall. I'd expect Republicans to say, well, not so fast -- the Republican contest was pretty well over with, so it's an apples-to-oranges comparison.

Who's right?

By the way, still waiting on Roanoke numbers. What gives?

-- Dwayne Yancey, Senior Editor

Paul Goldman is one of the smartest political strategists I know. Virginians know him as the mastermind behind Doug Wilder’s run for governor. One reason I like Paul is because his analysis often runs counter to everyone else’s. The prevailing opinion at the moment is that the Virginia results tonight are an embarrassment for McCain; Paul’s a Democrat, but he just called in from Richmond to say he thinks the big loser in Virginia tonight is Huckabee.
McCain didn’t put much effort into Virginia, but Huckabee still couldn’t beat him. “That’s the story of the night,” Goldman says. (By the way, McCain’s percentage has now dropped back under 50 percent.)
Goldman likes war analogies and offers two. First, he says Clinton is in deeper trouble than anyone realizes. “Clinton is like Colonel Travis at the Alamo. She’s making her last stand and she’s going to have to make it on her own, because Sam Houston isn’t showing up again.”
He also predicts Clinton will lose in Texas -- the next big states are Ohio and Texas on March 4 -- and then the game will be up . . . because of another war analogy.
Goldman predicts McCain will rally conservatives by opening up “a two-front war” on the Democrats -- and start trying to force them to commit themselves on the Iraq war. Once McCain starts tearing into the Democrats on a daily basis, Goldman figures Democrats will realize they can’t afford to continue the Obama-Clinton nomination fight -- and superdelegates will rally behind the leader. Who right now is Obama.
Anyone else have opinions on how this will play out from here?
-- Dwayne Yancey, Senior Editor

An old friend from Stuarts Draft up in Augusta County weighs in these observations:

Man, you’re on top of those numbers. I notice both O and Mc’s margins have been growing through the night.
Here’s one you might want to tackle on the blog: I’ve heard Karl Rove making much of the fact that Obama has been winning in traditional Red states, while McCain has been winning traditional Blue states - and that that points to a weakness for both. (ie., Why let states that don’t usually support your party choose your nominee?) I don’t follow that at all. It’s not as if the Ds who voted for Hillary in California and NY and Mass. wouldn’t vote for Obama in November if he got the nomination. And as the Virginia results tonight show, and Missouri last week, Obama can get independent voters excited enough, possibly, to turn Red states Blue. So: Is Rove on crack?
Also: Why are late-deciding voters consistently breaking for Clinton?

So what do others think?

-- Dwayne Yancey, Senior Editor

We need to update our electoral fault line. Earlier in the evening, Clinton looked to be safely ahead in Bedford County. But nothing seems safe this year. Now all but one precinct is in, and Obama has pulled ahead by 177 votes.
That slightly alters the dividing line I drew earlier. Plus we have word now from Botetourt County and a few other places. So here’s how the break point between the Obama landslide and Clinton country goes: Clinton took Bedford city; Obama took Bedford County, Clinton took Franklin County, but Obama took Henry County and Martinsville, while she took Patrick County. Think of it as a game of electoral hopscotch along the eastern slopes of the mountains.
On the west side of the Blue Ridge, Clinton took Botetourt, Roanoke County and Salem (still no word yet from Roanoke), but Obama took Montgomery County, Radford and Floyd, and then Clinton took everything west of the New River.
Still, let’s face it: This is a landslide. We’ve seen a lot of candidates over the years win in Virginia by just winning in Northern Virginia and a few other places. Obama has won, and won pretty overwhelmingly, across the state -- Southwest Virginia is the only exception.
-- Dwayne Yancey, Senior Editor

McCain just crossed the 50 percent threshold in the State Board of Elections official tally, which will be an important psychological breakthrough on what otherwise hasn't been a good night for the Republican front-runner. His number is likely to go up some, too. The biggest place we’re still waiting for is Virginia Beach, where the early precincts have gone pretty strong for McCain. We’re also still waiting on Roanoke -- not a peep from the Star City yet. And something is screwy with the numbers from Chesterfield County, which I’ve been waiting for all night. The state board says McCain got 93 percent of the vote and Huckabee got zero. Nobody gets zero. I’m asking my Republican sources what’s up with that.
-- Dwayne Yancey, Senior Editor

Larry Sabato, the University of Virginia political analyst, knows how to read election returns better than anyone I know, and he calls my attention to this figure: 2-to-1. That's the ratio by which Democrats outvoted Republicans today in Virginia. He says in full:

The worst news of all for VA Republicans is the relative turnout. Democrats are charged up, and by 2-to-1, they outvoted Republicans today. This is a very good sign for Democrats as they attempt to turn the state Blue for the first time since 1964. Even worse for the GOP, McCain has proven to be a weak candidate with his own party’s base. Having said all that, it’s a long time from February to November, but it’s already obvious which party has the most work to do.

University of Virginia

-- Dwayne Yancey, Senior Editor

On the Democratic side, we’re down to dissecting just how complete this Obama landslide is. Here’s one small measure: He won 54% of the vote in Highland County, the state’s smallest county.(Actual tally: 131-109). I looked at Highland because it’s also home to one of Virginia's “superdelegates,” Democratic National Committeewoman Susan Swecker, who has been working for Clinton. Sorry, Susan.
-- Dwayne Yancey, Senior Editor

CNN has finally caught up to what I’ve been saying for awhile now: McCain will win Virginia, but it won’t be pretty. It’s basically a two-man race, and McCain is still polling under 50%, thanks to votes for Ron Paul and some of the candidates who have already dropped out but still have their names on the ballot.
I’ve said to look at the suburbs. McCain is taking Fairfax with 63% of the vote. But he only took 52% of the vote in Prince William County. He’s winning Spotsylvania by 48-43. And he’s not up by much in the first precincts to report from Loudoun County.
Closer to home for us, Huckabee is thumping McCain in Roanoke County.
-- Dwayne Yancey, Senior Editor