Clinton and McCain edge ahead

REPUBLICAN John McCain and Democrat Hillary Clinton are moving on toward the next battles in an unpredictable White House race after scoring tough wins in the first major presidential voting in the US South and West.

Mr McCain narrowly defeated rival Mike Huckabee on Saturday in South Carolina – a state where his presidential hopes were destroyed in a bitter 2000 battle that set George Bush on a path to the White House.

The Vietnam War veteran said the win would give him a boost going into the next big Republican contest on 29 January in Florida, where Rudy Giuliani hopes to make his first mark.

"I still think this is very competitive," Mr McCain said yesterday before heading to Miami. "I think we are doing very well. I think Florida is very important. I don't know if it's a must-win, but it's certainly a very, very important race."

Neither party has established a clear front-runner in the race to pick the two candidates to contest the 4 November election to succeed Mr Bush, as the first major state-by-state battles produced multiple winners.

Mr Giuliani has all but staked his campaign on Florida, a populous, diverse state where polls show a tight race, with Mr McCain leading the former New York mayor as well as the former Massachusetts governor, Mitt Romney. "We're ready for everybody to come down here, join us," he said.

Among Democrats, the next big contest is on Saturday in South Carolina. In Nevada's caucus, Mrs Clinton beat Barack Obama in a close struggle that featured voting in the state's famed casino hotels. The pair had split the first two Democratic contests and ended up disputing who held the upper hand.

"I guess this is how the West was won," Mrs Clinton, a New York senator, said in Las Vegas.

Although Mrs Clinton won more votes on Saturday, Mr Obama said his strength in some areas outside Las Vegas would give him the support of 13 delegates to Mrs Clinton's 12. Delegates select the presidential nominee at the party convention in August.

Jill Derby, the Nevada Democratic Party head, said Mr Obama had the edge, but the count could change by April.

Mr Romney won a Republican contest in Nevada that his rivals largely skipped.

After South Carolina and Florida, both parties turn their attention to the 5 February "Super Tuesday" round of 22 state contests, a massive shift from the intimate politics of early voting states to coast-to-coast flights and big-budget advertising campaigns.

Mrs Clinton's first stop after her Nevada victory was in St Louis, Missouri, a state that will vote on 5 February.

Mr Obama, an Illinois senator who would be the first black US president, leads polls in South Carolina, where more than half of the Democratic primary voters are expected to be black.