ASHINGTON - Even as Senator John McCain yesterday committed another $1 million to his California advertising effort, his campaign has been working on an alternative strategy that assumes the Arizona senator cannot win delegates in that vital state, but must instead focus on winning an ''inside straight'' of the New England states, New York, and perhaps Ohio.
If the strategy works, McCain hopes to withstand an expected George W. Bush onslaught in Southern states on March 14 and hang on until another round of moderate, Northern states hold their votes through April.
Reeling from their primary defeats this week, both Republican McCain and Democrat Bill Bradley are reworking their insurgent strategies, hoping to come up with a modest number of victories in next week's Super Tuesday to remain politically alive for at least several weeks.
While the McCain campaign publicly continues to insist that the Arizona senator can win California, a top campaign aide who spoke on condition of anonymity said he and some other advisers have concluded there is little chance of winning the Republican vote in the state, and the winner gets all 162 delegates.
Under California's unusual rules, anyone can vote in the state's primary, but only the ballots of Republicans count toward the winner-take-all selection of delegates. As a result, McCain could win the popular vote in California but not get a single delegate.
But the McCain campaign is hopeful that it will at least get a publicity bonanza if it wins the non-binding''beauty contest'' vote in California. McCain himself yesterday continued to emphasize California's ''incredible importance'' and said he hopes to win there. If McCain wins the beauty contest, his strategists hope the result will put pressure on the state to allocate delegates based on the popular vote.
''We are not conceding California,'' McCain spokesman Dan McLagan said last night. ''We are putting up a heavy ad buy.'' The campaign also is hoping that McCain does so well in tonight's debate that the race turns around.
But the chances of winning delegates in California look slim. A Los Angeles Times poll found that Bush, the Texas governor, leads McCain among Republicans by 47 percent to 26 percent. While McCain has a history of slicing through poll deficits, he also has difficulty doing well among Republicans.
McCain's emphasis on the Northeast and Ohio comes at a time when his campaign has been internally divided over recent matters such as McCain's indecision about whether to participate in a California debate and his blast at Christian Coalition founder Pat Robertson. McCain will participate in the debate via satellite due to what he called a campaign commitment in New York.
Still, some analysts say the obstacles ahead may be insurmountable, especially in the wake of McCain's defeat on Tuesday in Washington, a moderate state McCain expected to win. Bush beat McCain there by 58 percent to 38 percent.
''McCain's always playing catch-up,'' said Michael Genovese, director of the Institute for Leadership Studies at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles. ''The establishment here is opposing him in ways that are almost pathological. They were expecting a quick, clean race by Bush and this adds to resentment of McCain.''
Now, after months of discussing issues and weeks of harsh attacks, the campaign has boiled down to the fundamental battle over who can accumulate enough delegates to win the nomination.
On the Republican side, Bush has 170 delegates, while McCain has 105, with 1,034 needed for nomination. There will be 613 delegates at stake Tuesday. McCain starts out with the assumption that he will sweep the five New England states that day, giving him 102 delegates. Bush also is competing in the region, but clearly is not expecting to do well there. When asked about New England yesterday, Bush responded that he hoped to win Maine.
McCain also hopes to win New York, which has 101 delegates. McCain leads in some recent New York polls, but Bush is hopeful about his chances there because it is a Republican-only primary.
McCain hopes to win Maryland and Minnesota, both moderate Super Tuesday states, with 65 delegates up for grabs. McCain may benefit from Maryland rules that allow independents to participate in the GOP primary, but not in the Democratic contest. But McCain is likely to be hurt by Minnesota's reliance on a caucus system, which favors an establishment candidate.
Bush, meanwhile, has strong hopes of winning Georgia, with 54 delegates, and Missouri, with 35 delegates. McCain's strategy relies heavily on doing well in the open primary of Ohio, with 69 delegates, but a just-released poll shows Bush ahead in Ohio by 53 percent to 36 percent.
Earlier this week, McCain sent signals through his strategists that he was focusing on Northeastern and Midwestern states. On Monday, he attacked Christian Coalition founder Pat Robertson as an ''agent of intolerance'' and he continued to criticize Bush for speaking at Bob Jones University, whose leaders have called Catholicism a ''cult.'' At the same time, McCain said that he couldn't participate in a California debate because he had a scheduling conflict in New York, a heavily Catholic state where McCain hopes Bush is hurt by the Bob Jones matter.
By Tuesday, however, both strategies were being called into question. McCain lost Washington despite authorizing phone calls to Catholics there about Bush's visit to Bob Jones University. And McCain reversed course on the debate, saying he would participate via satellite.
Privately, McCain advisers acknowledged that they were stunned at the scope of the Washington loss. The hope was that McCain would offset his expected Virginia defeat with a Washington win, and then ride a moderate wave to victory in California.
McCain, who yesterday once again hammered the Republican Party for its reliance on unlimited donations of ''soft money,'' faces the quandary of running against his party while seeking the support of its members. In the week after his Michigan victory, McCain's chief argument was that he was more electable in the general election than Bush. Now Bush's trio of victories on Tuesday, especially the Washington win, revitalizes his claim to electability.
If McCain does not do well on Super Tuesday, he then faces a series of March 14 contests in what looks like Bush country: Texas, Florida, Oklahoma, Mississippi, and Louisiana. McCain, who previously said the contest could be decided by March 7, now is hoping to hang on until at least the Illinois vote of March 21, and possibly until April 4, when Wisconsin and Pennsylvania hold their votes.
On the Democratic side, the delegate race has barely begun. With 2,170 delegates needed for nomination, Gore has 42 and Bradley has 27, according to an Associated Press tally. Yet after Bradley losses in Iowa, New Hampshire, and Washington, some of his advisers have discussed whether the former New Jersey senator should withdraw. Bradley said yesterday he will continue until at least Super Tuesday.
Bradley, who has yet to win any contest, stunned many of his top advisers by focusing all of his energies on a six-day tour of Washington, hoping that a win in Tuesday's non-binding primary would boost his candidacy nationally. But the opposite occurred. Vice President Al Gore beat Bradley in Washington by 68 percent to 31 percent, embarrassing the former New York Knick and raising questions about why he didn't focus more on New York.
Bradley clearly needs some major victories on Super Tuesday, starting in New York, which theoretically should be his best state aside from his home turf of New Jersey. Bradley campaign spokeswoman Kristen Ludecke, dismissing suggestions that the Washington loss had stalled the campaign, said the schedule now favors Bradley. Bradley is much better-known in the Northeast than elsewhere from his days as a basketball star. In addition, Bradley is hoping to do well in Missouri, where he was born and raised.
