WASHINGTON – Sen. John McCain padded his commanding delegate lead in the Republican presidential race Wednesday and urged conservative critics to cut him some slack. In a Democratic surprise, Hillary Rodham Clinton disclosed she’d lent $5 million to her cash-short campaign.

“And I think the results last night proved the wisdom of my investment,” said the former first lady, one day after trading victories with Barack Obama in a Super Tuesday string of contests from coast to coast.

The competition for Republican delegates was a runaway.

Nearly complete returns from Super Tuesday left McCain with 703 delegates, nearly 60 percent of the 1,191 needed to win the nomination at the national convention in St. Paul, Minn., this summer.

Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney had 293, former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee 190 and Texas Rep. Ron Paul 14.

Despite steadily lengthening odds, neither Romney nor Huckabee offered any hint they were ready to exit the race.

McCain, the Arizona senator, said the nomination was his, though, and added he recognized there was work to be done to unify the party after acrimonious campaigning.

“I do hope that at some point we would just calm down a little bit and see if there’s areas we can agree on,” he said, one day in advance of an appearance before conservative activists who have shunned his candidacy.

The Democratic delegate count lagged, the result of party rules that shunned the type of winner-take-all primaries in states such as New York and New Jersey that helped McCain build his advantage.