Kerry caps weekend sweep with Maine win

By Seattle Times wire services

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John Kerry coasted to victory in the Maine caucuses yesterday, wrapping up a three-state weekend sweep that pushed the Democratic front-runner closer to the party nomination.

Howard Dean finished a distant second in another disappointment for the one-time front-runner, and Rep. Dennis Kucinich of Ohio was third in one of his better showings of the primary season.

The Massachusetts senator tacked the Maine win onto resounding victories in Michigan and Washington state Saturday for a record of 10 wins in 12 contests and, more importantly, a substantial chunk of the delegates needed to secure the nomination.

With about 50 percent of the caucuses reporting, Kerry had 45 percent, Dean 26 percent and Kucinich 15 percent. Sen. John Edwards and retired Army Gen. Wesley Clark, who had focused on other states, had 9 percent and 4 percent, respectively. The Rev. Al Sharpton had 0 percent.

At midnight, state party officials said they were continuing to enter data from distant towns and cities but would not make any more caucus results public until this morning.

Election 2004 Q&A Sen. John Kerry had another strong showing in last weekend's caucuses and primaries leading up to the Democratic Party's national convention in July. Seattle Times chief political reporter David Postman tries to sort it all out as he answers your questions on the race for the White House. Go to www.seattletimes.com from noon to 1 p.m. tomorrow to take part.

"Today, the voters of Maine have sent a message that George Bush's days are numbered and change is coming to America," Kerry said in a statement. He added that he was "truly honored and humbled" by the confidence of the state voters.

Kerry has more than twice as many delegates as his closest pursuer, as his win in Maine pushed his total to 426, compared with Dean's 184, according to an Associated Press tally. It takes 2,162 delegates to win the nomination.

Kerry's winning streak is beginning to demoralize his opponents. Aides to Clark and Edwards said they expect their candidates to lose tomorrow when Virginia and Tennessee hold their primaries, the first all-Southern slate of the primary race.

Clark and Edwards, who promised yesterday to forge ahead despite Kerry's increasing advantage, are counting on a showdown in Wisconsin, where the front-runner will face withering attacks from all of his rivals, with the potential for a slip-up by the leader.

Kerry, campaigning like a front-runner yesterday, ignored his primary opponents and criticized President Bush on Iraq. He also picked up critical backing from Virginia Gov. Mark Warner.

Seizing on an interview yesterday on NBC's "Meet the Press," in which Bush acknowledged he may have been wrong when claiming that Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction, Kerry said: "Now, the president is giving us a new reason for sending people to war. The problem is not just that he is changing his story now. It is that he appears he was telling the American people stories in 2002."

Clark also criticized Bush, telling CNN, "To me, the problem is less about the intelligence community and more about how the president made his decision to take us into this war in Iraq. We still don't know why we went to war in Iraq."

Clark, Dean and Edwards, appearing separately on yesterday's television talk shows, all said they would continue to challenge Kerry for the Democratic nomination despite his advantage in the polls and in endorsements.

Dean, winless since the start of voting, declined in separate interviews to repeat his earlier assertion that he would withdraw from the race if he lost the Feb. 17 Wisconsin primary.

With an eye evidently on his own legacy, Dean said in Waterville, Maine, that "we already accomplished one of our goals" in running for president: emboldening Democrats to take a tougher line against Bush. "The Democratic Party has had a miraculous spine transplant," he said.

Clark, en route to a jobs forum in Racine, Wis., said on CNN that he would run at least through the March 2 "Super Tuesday" primaries that include California, Ohio and New York. "We've got a lot of support across this country," he said. "We do expect to go on and do expect to be there on Super Tuesday."

Edwards noted on "Fox News Sunday" that 75 percent of delegates to the Democratic National Convention will still be up for grabs after Wisconsin votes.

"I view this very much as a long-term process, and we're in this for the long term," said the North Carolina senator, who visited Baptist churches in Richmond, Va., before attending a Democratic dinner in Nashville, Tenn., that Clark also attended.

Speaking at the dinner, former Vice President Al Gore said Bush had manipulated Americans' emotions by taking the nation to war in Iraq. "He played on our fears" after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, Gore said. "He took America on an ill-conceived foreign adventure, dangerous to our troops, an adventure that was preordained and planned way before 9-11 ever happened."

Compiled from reports by The Associated Press, The Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times and the Chicago Tribune.

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