The street sweepers are washing the pavement in the alleys and streets of the French Quarter. New Orleans bar workers are mopping up the funk that comes from days of revelry while the bar owners are counting their riches. Catholic faithful are going to masses to have some ash smeared on their foreheads. Lent is here and in the next 40 days leading up to Easter the city will relax. Almost rest.

But Ash Wednesday in New Orleans is also the day of the Louisiana Primary. There will probably not be as big a cleanup as one might think. The election results from todays primaries and caucuses show McCain is the only candidate that cleaned up in the polls. The Democrats are still pretty much on the same level when it comes to their peoples support.

McCain’s overwhelming win of delegates is due to the “Huckabee Factor”. Mike has taken a lot of the “liberal” Republican vote from Mitt much to Romney’s chagrin. His whining today just alienated more of his would be supporters giving John McCain more of an advantage. That scares me.

With McCain the probable Republican candidate for president America is facing a strange future. His stance on the war in Iraq along with his hinting at future wars, Iran probably, could make or break him. Especially if his Democratic opposition remains weak on their demands to withdraw our troops from Iraq. If the Democrats can’t show strong we may be facing Johns proposed 100 years there.

New Orleans, and much of Louisiana, has a large black Democrat population. The strength of the black vote became clear in 1992 when Democrat Edwin Edwards, a known criminal and liar, was running against Republican racist David Duke for Governor. More black people registered and voted than any time in Louisiana history. The crook won in a landslide even though the Republican Duke got a huge turnout of white voters.

Obama and Clinton are running neck and neck. Clinton has only 100 more delegates then Obama. The primaries in the weeks to come can change that. There are more delegates yet to be chosen and Barak may overcome Hillary in the polls. With only 56 delegates at stake there Louisiana wont be a deciding factor in the final outcome but will probably bring the race closer. I think Obama will take the state today.

The really surprising state for Obama was Idaho. Such a huge amount of their votes going to him there shows me the race card is fading in this campaign. When I was a kid growing up in Idaho there was an underlying racism that welcomed many white supremacy groups  to build compounds and enclaves all over the state. I was pleased to see that the old days are going away and people are starting to think clearer.

So as the post Carnival cleanup continues in The Big Easy the cleanup in the polls wont come. The democratic candidates will have to really duke it out. Lets hope the mudslinging doesn’t start too bad. Thats a mess that may cause McCain to clean up in November.

We can’t have that.

Stumble it!