Vermont Gov. Jim Douglas will stand up at Dartmouth College on Monday and support Sen. John McCain for the Republican presidential nomination. The endorsement will come on the eve of the New Hampshire primary.
Douglas will say that it's McCain's character and experience that make him the best choice for the nomination, spokesman Jason Gibbs said Sunday.
"John McCain is a principled leader whose character, judgment and experience make him best prepared to lead the nation on Day 1," Douglas said in a prepared statement. "John McCain is a reformer who is willing to stand up for taxpayers and against special interests."
Not a big surprise that McCain is the one Douglas chose. McCain came to Vermont for a Republican Party fund-raiser not too many years ago. He was supposed to come for an event with congressional candidate Martha Rainville (whom Douglas strongly supported) last year but fog prevented his plane from landing in Rutland. And, of course, former Douglas campaign aide Jim Barnett is heading McCain's New Hampshire campaign.
Does it matter, though, what the governor of Vermont says about the presidential race?
If you were Joe or Josephine Voter sitting in New Hampshire pondering your choices in Tuesday's primary, would you be turning to your spouse and saying, "Well, honey, Jim Douglas likes McCain, so I guess that decides it"? Probably that would not stand on its own as a deciding factor, but it also can't hurt a presidential candidate to have as many friends up on the dais as he/she can find.
Gibbs said all the top-tier GOP candidates sought Douglas' backing. His theory is that particularly N.H. voters along the Vermont border hear a fair amount about Douglas from their newspapers and TV stations, so when they hear that Douglas is endorsing McCain it has some merit.
Funny, though, that last Thursday Douglas specifically said he had no plans to go to New Hampshire in the coming days. Define the word "plans." Apparently he had plans to make plans.
- Terri Hallenbeck
