The Musgrove-Wicker Race and the Presidential Contest

Sidney Salter's October 15 piece was about the Roger Wicker-Ronnie Musgrove special U. S. Senate race and its relation to the presidential election.

Mississippi voters gave [George W.] Bush his highest popular vote percentages in those elections.

This is at least the third column in which Sidney has presented this misinformation regarding the 2000 and 2004 elections. In 2000, the Magnolia State voted 57 percent for Bush, as Alabama and South Carolina also did. At least six other states gave the Texan even higher percentages: Texas and Alaska, 59 percent each; Oklahoma, 60 percent; Utah, 67 percent; and Idaho and Wyoming, 69 percent each.

In 2004, Mississippi gave Bush 60 percent of its vote. Texas and Alaska each gave him 61 percent; Alabama, 63 percent; Oklahoma, 66 percent; Idaho and Wyoming, 69 percent each; and Utah, 72 percent.

... Republicans have carried all presidential elections since the 87.1 percent Mississippi landslide for GOP nominee Barry Goldwater in 1964 - all save the 1976 campaign carried by Democratic presidential nominee and then-Georgia Gov. Jimmy Carter.

In 1968, former Alabama governor George Wallace, running as an independent, carried Mississippi with 63.5 percent. Vice President Hubert Humphrey, the Democratic nominee, finished second with 23 percent. The Republican nominee, former Vice President Richard Nixon, actually ran third with 13.5 percent, his lowest vote in any state.

Jimmy Carter served as governor of Georgia from January 1971 to January 1975. Hence, when he was elected president in November 1976, he had been out of office for nearly two years.

Carter's narrow win in Mississippi put him over the top in electoral votes.

I agree that Senator John McCain will likely win the Magnolia State on November 4. While the Musgrove-Wicker race is surprisingly close, I still believe that the Republican Wicker will be victorious.