I must confess, none of these guys make me very excited:

More than 20 months before any real votes are cast, Republican Senate leader Bill Frist of Tennessee won a straw poll on Saturday of party activists choosing their early favorite in the 2008 White House race.

Frist, who packed the home-state crowd with supporters wearing blue “Frist is my leader” buttons, won nearly 37 percent of the 1,427 votes cast by delegates to the Southern Republican Leadership Conference.

Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney was second with 13 percent, while Sen. George Allen of Virginia finished tied for third with President George W. Bush, whose name was added to the ballot by 10 percent of the delegates at the urging of Arizona Sen. John McCain.

The poll results, while meaning little in the long run, could give the top two finishers, Frist and Romney, a boost in recognition heading into the 2008 campaign.

The win for Frist followed a tough year in which he became the target of a federal probe of his stock sales and was criticized for his Senate leadership.

Frist and Romney were among six possible presidential candidates who spoke to the gathering of nearly 2,000 activists from 26 states in what served as an unofficial kickoff to the 2008 race. All registered delegates were eligible to vote in the poll, sponsored by political tip sheet The Hotline.

More at Hotline.

Ankle Biting Pundits has been breaking news on the story. Here’s the latest:

I’m a big fan of National Journal’s The Hotline, but I cannot believe what they have done in the last 24 hours, if my sources are correct.

According to my sources, the Hotline folks have colluded with representatives from Sen. Bill Frist’s organization to alter the straw poll ballots to allow attendees at the Southern Republican Leadership Conference a second choice. Why? Because the “write in Bush” vote of confidence campaign had apparently gained so much momentum that it became clear a majority of voters would indeed write in the president’s name.

According to my sources, Frist’s team approached the Hotline people with the idea to rejigger the ballots because, as we have reported, Frist has a whole lot riding on this straw poll victory. Frist’s organization VolPAC spent over $100,000 bussing in, boarding, feeding, and entertaining over 930 “ringers.”

In full panic over the possibility that he might lose, Frist is now hoping his “ringers” will vote for him and write in the president (which, by the way, makes no sense.)

I am told lots of MSM types — no fans of President Bush — are scratching their heads at Hotline’s rather un-democratic move to deny the president a show of support from his fellow Republicans.

Stay tuned. This thing is getting weirder and weirder.