Obama Handily Wins Nebraska, Louisiana, Washington

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'Hopeful' Obama Makes Appeal to Virginia Democrats

Barack Obama states his case for the democratic nomination at the Jefferson Jackson dinner Saturday night in Richmond, Va.

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His persistence has become an annoyance to some McCain supporters, one of whom lashed out at Huckabee yesterday. Del. Christopher B. Saxman, who is co-chairing McCain's Virginia campaign, called on Huckabee to get out of the race and to speak out against anti-McCain phone calls being made in the state.

"The fight for the Republican nomination is all but over. There is no path to victory for Mike Huckabee, yet his supporters continue to attack John McCain," Saxman said. "The sooner our party is united behind our eventual nominee, the better off we will be to face the onslaught from MoveOn.org and the Democratic Party."

Huckabee told reporters that he condemns negative phone calls, calling them "deplorable" and "despicable" but adding that the campaign finance laws pushed by McCain made it impossible for Huckabee to stop the calls. He repeatedly said that it is still possible for him to win the Republican nomination.

"I didn't major in math," he told the crowd at the Conservative Political Action Conference meeting yesterday morning. "I majored in miracles, and I still believe in them."

"We certainly congratulate Governor Huckabee and his supporters," McCain spokesman Brian Rogers said last night. "The reality is that John McCain is the presumptive nominee of our party. We'll campaign in these upcoming states as long as Governor Huckabee is in the race, but our main focus is on uniting the Republican Party for victory in November."

Huckabee has decided to continue his campaign even as many leaders in the Republican Party finally seem willing to coalesce around McCain after a year in which many conservatives eyed him warily. In the past several days, a steady stream of party officials and others have endorsed McCain, lending his candidacy the aura of inevitability.

But McCain lost the straw poll at the CPAC meeting to Romney even though Romney had dropped out by the time most of the votes were cast. Romney edged out McCain, 35 percent to 34 percent, according to the CPAC Web site.

Huckabee told reporters that he will wait until he or McCain wins the needed 1,191 delegates. "I won't drop out until at least that happens," he said. "Then we'll see."