The Texas governor stood before 600 cheering supporters in an ornate Cincinnati theater Tuesday night to take the measure of a Virginia win built by a strong showing of Republican regulars and the religious right.

"We are uniting our party without compromising principle," he said, speaking in a state he hopes to win next week in the Super Tuesday contests.

Bush took a congratulatory call from rival John McCain minutes after the polls closed in Virginia and the outcome was apparent. In his subsequent speech, Bush took a poke at McCain, suggesting he's not sufficiently conservative -- and his tax cuts are too mild -- to distinguish him from Democrats.

"It's important to have sharp distinctions," he said. "We don't need a candidate who in a debate with Al Gore will not sound like opponents. They will sound like a ticket."

Bush said Virginians "rejected the politics of pitting one religion against another." McCain had gone to Virginia Beach, home of the Christian Coalition, and criticized some leaders of the religious right for sowing divisions -- on Bush's behalf -- in the campaign.

Bush also went after McCain for lacking a comprehensive education plan and played up his own record in making schools better in Texas.

McCain has been "sitting on the sidelines for 17 years in Washington," Bush said. "A candidate with no plan for schools has no plan for America's future."

Bush's detailed plan calls for using federal education money to reward and penalize states according to their success in raising student achievement, as measured, in part, by a national sampling test or an equivalent.

Although McCain also talks about improving standards, he has proposed giving "no strings" aid to schools.

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McCain wasted no time congratulating Bush -- and playing down the results.

"It seems as if he has a Southern strategy here," he said, "doing well in Southern states. We'll look forward to Super Tuesday, when we have a broad section, a cross-section of America voting all on that same day."

McCain called Bush from his bus on a California road to tip his hat to him.

Then he told reporters he wouldn't have done anything differently in Virginia because "we were way behind" there all along.

He said his speech about the religious right was not really meant for Virginians but something he wants voters in coming primaries to remember.

"We were talking nationally," he said, "not to Virginia."

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Super scenarios danced in their heads as the Republican presidential campaigns fixed their minds firmly on week-away Super Tuesday and beyond.

The ifs, ands and buts were especially dizzying coming from McCain and his aides as they sketched out how they can make it all come together for a campaign that, according to most thinking, can't afford many setbacks.

"No one has been able to predict this thing," McCain mused in Fresno, Calif.

But that didn't stop him and others from trying. McCain media strategist Mike Murphy said the Arizona senator could conceivably absorb a loss in California -- the biggest single prize, with 162 delegates -- next Tuesday if he wins in New York (101 delegates) and some New England states while making Ohio a real battleground.

Still, McCain plans to devote most of the week to California. "There's no doubt of the absolute importance of California," he said. "To understate it is just not a recognition of reality."

For his part, Bush brushed aside a poll indicating his lead over McCain in Ohio has dropped to 17 points from 34.

"I'm winning by double digits because I've got a positive message," Bush said in Cleveland, a wry smile spreading.

Republicans vote in 13 states in the March 7 series known as Super Tuesday. The contests will yield 613 delegates, more than half the 1,034 needed to clinch the GOP presidential nomination.

"I still say it could all be over a week from today," McCain said. "I'm not sure whether that's my best sense or my urgent desire."

In any event, some of the McCain scenarios take him deep into March.

His strategists were looking hopefully ahead to the March 10 primary in Colorado, friendly for McCain.

And they said they weren't writing off Florida, where Bush's brother, Jeb, is governor.

McCAIN AND BUSH appear set to compete in another arena -- late-night comedy and talk.

McCain agreed to appear with Jay Leno on NBC's "Tonight Show with Jay Leno" show on Wednesday. Bush was expected to go on the "Late Show with David Letterman" on CBS, but negotiations were continuing on whether he would do it Wednesday from St. Louis via satellite or Friday from New York, where the show is based.