What's wrong with this picture? Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton come to Texas and draw big -- in some cases huge -- crowds at public rallies.  John McCain comes to Dallas and appears at Texas Instruments.  He finds a big employer who's willing to let interested employees form his audience.  What it says is that McCain can't draw a big crowd and/or he doesn't have the organization to put on a big public event. That said, McCain will win the Texas primary, even though Mike Huckabee continues to make a strong push here and even though some Republicans may vote in the Democratic primary.

Huckabee had no problem drawing a crowd recently at Collin County Community College.  Some who attended said there were 2,000 to 3,000 there -- more than the 1,000 in published reports.  He will stage a rally at 8 a.m. Monday at SMU at the student center. Huckabee has a built-in and somewhat hidden base among evangelicals.  Even so, area GOP leaders predict McCain will carry the state comfortably because, between the two, he has the only chance to win in November.

To the party faithful, even worse than having the wrong candidate is to not win at all and lose the power that comes with the White House.  So, as one area activist says, Republicans will vote for McCain in November but they don't care anything about going to see him.  He's "boring" and they're unenamored.

Some are so unenamored that they're voting in the Democratic race. There's an ulterior motive, to be sure.  They think Hillary Clinton would be the easiest to defeat in November, and the opportunity to beat up on the Clintons is just so appetizing.  

Yet others, people who traditionally vote for Republicans but are not party activists, are so disappointed by the Bush regime and so caught up in the dynamics of the Democratic race for the nomination that they are migrating to the dark side.  And they know they will still have the McCain option in November.  Who knows how they will vote in eight months, but the disarray in the Republican party has hard-line Texas Democrats talking for the first time in years about the state crossing back to blue.

The early voting turnout has fed the idea of such an outcome. Through Thursday, more than a half million had voted in the Democratic priary, more than four times the level of turnout in 2004.  Just 173,000 had voted in the Republican primary, the day before early voting ended.

Republican unity has been marred by conservative outrage on talk radio about McCain and rejection of his candidacy by some religious conservatives.

And, after the previous years of Bush-mania in the state -- the homegrown governor goes to Washington -- Texas Republicans never found their candidate this year.  Months ago when the field was full Texas Republicans meeting in Fort Worth favored Duncan Hunter -- a near one-issue (immigration) candidate -- in a straw ballot.  It was, in part, a slap at the major candidates who failed to attend but reflected the disarray from the beginning.  Rudy Giuliani had a lot of Texas support because he was perceived as the winning candidate.  But national polls meant nothing after the voting begn. Many GOP leaders thought Fred Thompson would their guy, but he failed to meet the test. And Mitt Romney had a smattering of support. Now it's down to Huckabee, who the social issue conservatives love, and John McCain, who party activists tolerate because they still want to ride a winning horse. 

The McCain campaign has been robot calling Texas Republicans trying to scare up a crowd for a victory party at the Fairmont Hotel Tuesday night. Some folks will show up, and it will be a shock if McCain doesn't win the primary vote by a good margin.  But I'm not looking for any joy in Mudville.

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