- Dixville Notch casts its votes.
- Veteran scribe Walter Shapiro is bored.
- Campaign organization still matters, guards against wild swings.
- Is Huntsman having his moment?
- The Union Leader makes its final front-page case against Romney.
Must Reads
Morning Must Reads: Bain
- A final weekend of polling finds Paul and Huntsman in the hunt for second, Santorum slipping and Romney still way ahead in New Hampshire.
- With $5 million from a casino magnate, Gingrich’s PAC buys up an anti-Bain movie, floods South Carolina with ads.
[youtube=http://youtu.be/_evS-T-c35M]
- The candidate himself decries
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Morning Must Reads: Incrementalist
- The economy adds 200,000 jobs in December as unemployment falls to 8.5%. The broader U-6 measure plunged to 15.2%.
- A typo may have swung Iowa, not that it really matters.
- The Boston Globe endorses Huntsman, dings Romney.
- Gingrich says he’ll tell the NAACP, “the African American community should demand paychecks and not be
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Morning Must Reads: Alliance
- Romney’s Iowa win, five years in the making.
- What he paid for each vote.
- New Hampshire polls are static.
- Huntsman’s first ad of the cycle is super jump-cutty:
Morning Must Reads: Eight
- Eight votes, people. Eight.
- Winning ugly’s still winning. For Romney, so’s tying.
- Some lessons for Republicans out of Iowa. One reason to worry.
- John McCain will endorse Romney today, reports Internet cat digest.
Morning Must Reads: Iowa
- Happy caucus day.
- Meet the 12 different flavors of undecided voters.
- Here are the final pitches they’ll get from caucus captains.
- Contra criticisms, caucus-goers well represent the party.
- Nate Silver’s final forecast.
- Romney says he’s going to win the thing, Newt can’t make up his mind.
Morning Must Reads: Photo Finish
- A Public Policy Polling survey out of Iowa finds Paul, Romney and Santorum all within two points of the lead over the weekend.
- The tail end of a Des Moines Register poll showed the same.
- Its pollster says Santorum has the hot hand.
- He’s trying to mend his perceived electability problem with his closing argument on TV:
Morning Must Reads: Swagger
- Another polling snapshot of Iowa shows the race in the same shape as earlier this week.
- Romney finds his Iowa swagger.
- He’s abandoned the expectations game.
- And says “Ron Paul’s not going to be our nominee.”
Morning Must Reads: Underdog
- Romney’s closing argument in Iowa:
[youtube=http://youtu.be/W4ypqKig9_I]
- His Super PAC is still deep-sixing Gingrich.
- Newt Inc. is doing just fine.
Morning Must Reads: Pragmatism
- The Ron Paul pile-on, save for Romney, has begun in earnest.
- Paul counter-punches.
- Pragmatism is Romney’s ally, even in Iowa.
- Paul’s still ahead there, but the top six are hard to figure.
- He could change the party, even without a win.
Morning Must Reads: Golden
- $10 million in political TV advertising has been broadcast in Iowa this month; Perry, Romney and their respective PACs account for 80% of it.
- Romney’s campaign says he has the nomination all locked up.
- There are scenarios where he could lose, but not so many.
- The rise of absentee voting in Florida could decide its primary early.
Morning Must Reads: Rubes
- Obama won a tactical victory on the payroll tax cut, if not a particularly substantive one.
- Charles Krauthammer thinks Republicans got played.
- The House is poised to pass the two-month deal today.
- Vice President Biden counters Romney in a Des Moines op-ed, implicitly ties him to Bush 43.
Morning Must Reads: 2011
- House Republicans are in a right pickle.
- Romney’s PAC continues its bombing campaign against everyone but Paul in Iowa:
[youtube=http://youtu.be/lBg8OtR74qM]
- Ron Paul walks out of CNN interview after being questioned on racist newsletters from the ’90s.