Hunter bowing out? UPDATED and BUMPED -- False alarm

From Michelle Malkin:

For Immediate Release: January 7, 2007
Contact: Bob Bevill, (978) 339-3198, (603) 913-1770

Presidential Candidate and California Congressman Duncan Hunter will be making a major announcement today at 2:00 p.m. (EST), regarding the future of his Presidential bid. All media are encouraged to attend or contact Bob Bevill, National Media Coordinator, to arrange alternate interviews.

DUNCAN HUNTER ANNOUNCEMENT
Radisson Hotel Lobby700 Elm Street
Manchester, New Hampshire2:00 p.m. (EST)

This seriously can't be anything but an announcement of withdrawing from the race. No candidate would set aside time to simply make a campaign statement, so we guess that this is his fond farewell from the race. And that's a shame, really. Like the Paul-bat, who is sitting in single digits, Rep. Hunter was not invited to the FOX News debate last night. The only invitees were those in double digits only. FOX stated that they had a smaller venue for the debate, therefore neither Paul nor Hunter were invited. No one can blame FOX News for that decision as only five people seem poised to take the nomination. (That doesn't excuse the Paul-bat supporters and how they acted towards Sean Hannity in New Hampshire. Click that video to watch it, and tell me these people aren't unhinged.)

It's sad that he didn't catch on. Duncan Hunter is a good man, and one that will be missed. The only question left is who does he throw his support behind? He is polling lower than Ron Paul's national 3%, so who would his support benefit. The obvious guess would be Romney, and it would lend credence to him in terms of immigration. He's not going to give his support to the Huckster, who was a disaster with immigration related issues. Giuliani is seen as a pro-illegal candidate despite what he is saying. He won't give it to John "Mr. Amnesty" McCain. And his support isn't going to help the Paul-bat campaign. If he endorses anyone, it'll probably be Romney.

Publius II

UPDATE: He's not out. His presser was a complaint to ABC and FOX for excluding him from the debates:

If you're a fan of Rep. Duncan Hunter, don't worry, he's still running for president. The Hunter campaign alerted the media to a major campaign announcement coming at 2pmET today, which some may have thought involved dropping out of the race. Instead, he used the opportunity to lash out against ABC News and Fox News Channel for excluding him from their debates/forum this weekend.

"Some knucklehead executives in ABC closed me out. Similarly, Fox News decided not to allow me to take part in the Fox News debate on Sunday," he said.

Hunter said that he picked up one delegate in the Wyoming caucus, which put him ahead, at least until tomorrow night, of candidates like Rudy Guiliani and John McCain.

Hunter wasn't done. "A guy who actually had some points on the scoreboard, that was myself, was not allowed to attend," he said. "Knucklehead, arrogant executives in the corporate media world at ABC and Fox News, in some third or fourth story glass offices, decided my campaign was over."

It wasn't, as he announced to applause from the gathered crowd. Interestingly, CNN was the only network to pick up the speech live, despite it being advertised earlier in the afternoon on Fox News Channel. MSNBC came in a few minutes after the announcement.

OK, first off lets' get something straight here, and I don't want to bag on hunter supporters, but Duncan has no shot. No one cares how many delegates he has because he has no shot. No candidate that ever ran for the presidency was able to win when in the primaries they were polling less than 3%. Ron Paul has no shot and he's is polling at 3%. For that matter right now, Fred Thompson's potential for grabbing the nomination fall between slim and none despite the fact he has a large amount of supporters.

I admire the man for staying in the race, but unless something drastic happens (say that all the frontrunners go down in a plane crash, and he and Paul are the only two left), Duncan Hunter doesn't have a shot to take the nomination. His campaign is dead in the water, and I'd expect some of the news outlets to keep leaving him and Paul out of debates. The media is portraying this to be a five man race when it isn't. It's a two man race between Romney and Rudy. One of those two will be the nominee. (Even if by some miracle the Huckster takes South Carolina, he won't get the nomination. And John McCain just keeps poking the GOP base in the eye.)

We would have liked to have seen a true conservative have a shot at the nomination, but it's plain to see that we're not going to get one. We have a choice between two people right now. I know this because I talk to a lot of conservatives almost daily, and they're saying the same thing. Sure, we get the Hunter supporters every once in a while, and the occasional Paul-bat that shrieks and runs away. But the consensus that we see right now is that this is a two dog fight, and come 5 February we'll either have a nominee, or we're going to trudge along until one of the two of them decides to bow out.

Personally speaking, this little presser sounded more like a whinefest. I'll give him his credit in that all the candidates (yes, even Ron Paul) should be at the debates. But the media is doping what should have done already. They're winnowing the field.

Publius II