McCain clinches, Clinton rallies

DALLAS, March 5 (UPI) -- John McCain clinched the Republican nomination for U.S. president Tuesday, while Hillary Clinton revived her flagging Democratic campaign against Barack Obama.

McCain, the 71-year-old Vietnam hero and senator from Arizona whose chances were thought dead by many political analysts in the early days of the campaign, completed his comeback by taking Texas, Ohio, Vermont and Rhode Island -- the final stakes in the hopes of former Gov. Mike Huckabee. Those victories eased him past the 1,191 delegates he needed for the Republican nomination and forced Huckabee, an ordained Baptist minister, to end his attempt to rally the party's conservative right wing.

Clinton, the New York senator with the ex-president husband, captured Texas, Ohio and Rhode Island, ending Obama's string of 12 straight wins. The Illinois senator, the youngest candidate in the race, took only Vermont Tuesday. It was widely viewed Clinton needed those wins to keep her hopes alive, though she still trails in the delegate count 1,451 to 1,365.

Obama, speaking in San Antonio, Texas, renewed his clarion call for change and went on the offensive against Clinton and McCain, who both have criticized his short resume, the Houston Chronicle reported.

"John McCain and Hillary Clinton should know there is nothing empty about the call for affordable healthcare," he said.

Clinton was in Columbus, Ohio, where she reminded her cheering legions "As Ohio goes, so goes the nation."

"We're going on, we're going strong and we're going all the way," she vowed.

In Dallas, McCain said his campaign "must be and will be more than another tired debate of false promises, empty sound bites or useless arguments from the past that address not a single American's concerns or their family's security."

McCain was expected to stop by the White House Wednesday to meet with President George Bush.

Huckabee called McCain "an honorable man" who "has run an honorable campaign."

"I will do everything possible to unite our party," Huckabee said in Irving, Texas.