Ron Paul has left the building
by Mark Silva<

Ron Paul is not here.

He is nowhere in this posting, not to be seen in the halls of the Washington hotel where the Conservative Political Action Convention wraps up today.

Mike Huckabee is here, along with a few dozen mostly young supporters waiting with signs at the door to greet the former governor of Arkansas, the last of the Republican candidates for president to speak here. Paul spoke the other day. So did Mitt Romney, as he was quitting the race, leaving the contest for the party's nomination, apparently, to Sen. John McCain.

The question is, when the contest is finished, where will these people go?

Where will the people who conspired to raise $6 million for Ron Paul in one record day of Internet-fundraisng in December go? Will they settle for McCain, who drew boos among the cheers as he appeared here this week, his party's nominee-apparent?

Will they stay with their party? Or will they move to the third or fourth presidential candidate on the ballot in November? The candidate like Paul, in 1988, when he ran as the Libertarian. He appeared on the ballots in 46 states and drew 431,750 votes, less than one percent.

Will these people who have campaigned so fervently for the Huckabees and Pauls of the party become one-percenters in November? Or will they rally to their party's cause?

Their candidates may be gone, but the decisions they make in November will have a significant bearing on the outcome of the election on which everyone is so focused here, this cold grey morning in Washington on which Mike Huckabee will take the last candidate's stand at the CPAC, the place where so much doubt about John McCain resides.

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