John McCain has picked up the endorsement of The State, the largest newspaper in South Carolina, which published an editorial today citing McCain's experience, war record, and steadfastness on the Iraq War.

"John McCain has shown more clearly than anyone on the American political scene today that he loves his country, and would never mislead or dishonor it," the editors say. "He is almost unique in his determination to do what is right, whatever the cost. And he usually has a clear vision of what’s right."

As for Mike Huckabee, whom many evangelicals are considering: "Gov. Huckabee is an exciting newcomer who shows a wonderful ability to connect with voters’ concerns, and Republicans could do far worse than to choose him. But his utter lack of knowledge of foreign affairs is unsettling."

The Nevada caucuses are a week away, and the state teachers' union has decided to throw a monkey-wrench into the legalities of the process. The Nevada State Education Association has filed suit against the state Democratic Party, on the grounds that the nine at-large caucus locations set up on the Las Vegas Strip make it too easy for workers there to caucus, while no similar accommodations have been made for other Nevadans.

Those workers, if they can come out and caucus, are expected to vote heavily for Barack Obama, who won the Culinary Workers Union endorsement this past Wednesday.

"This has been a fully transparent process," state Democratic party spokeswoman Kirsten Searer told the Las Vegas Sun. "These rules have been approved by the Democratic National Committee and the campaigns have been fully informed throughout this process, which started in May."

A new Rasmussen poll shows that there might just be some life left in Mitt Romney after all, giving him a narrow lead over John McCain in Michigan. Here are the numbers, compared to their last Michigan poll from early December:

Romney 26% (+6)
McCain 25% (+17)
Huckabee 17% (-4)
Thompson 9% (+0)
Paul 8% (+1)
Giuliani 6% (-13)

The Michigan primary is emerging as a real question mark for the GOP race — our Election Central Poll Tracker shows that one recent poll gives the lead to McCain, another to Huckabee, and this one to Romney.

Yesterday, as part of his racial damage control tour, Bill Clinton took a shot at Obama that he's frequently taken during the campaign, charging that the Illinois Senator's criticism of Hillary's support of the war is disingenuous in light of something Obama said back in 2004.

Bill pointed out that at the time, Obama said that he could not say how he would have voted on the war had he been in the Senate himself in the run-up to the invasion. Bill has repeatedly pointed to this quote to cast doubt on Obama's anti-war bona fides, and it's become part of the conversation of Campaign 2008.

Obama defended himself against this criticism a few days ago, recalling that at the time he didn't want to criticize the war votes of John Kerry and John Edwards in the middle of the 2004 presidential campaign. Obama accused the former president of cherry picking from his past quote:

He keeps on giving half the quote. I was always against the war...obviously I didn’t want to criticize them on the eve of their nomination. So I said, `Well, I don’t know what -- you know, I wasn’t in the Senate. I can’t say for certain what I would have done if I was there. I know that from where I stood the case was not made.’ He always leaves that out.

As it happens, Obama is right. Here is the actual Obama quote in question, from a New York Times article on July 26, 2004 (via Nexis):

In a recent interview, he declined to criticize Senators Kerry and Edwards for voting to authorize the war, although he said he would not have done the same based on the information he had at the time.

''But, I'm not privy to Senate intelligence reports,'' Mr. Obama said. ''What would I have done? I don't know. What I know is that from my vantage point the case was not made.''

So, clearly, Obama was pointing to the fact that he wasn't in the Senate at the time as a way of tactfully avoiding criticizing his party's presidential and vice-presidential nominees. It's perfectly clear that Obama was in fact against the war at the time. His position then -- as now -- was that the case for war had not been made and that the invasion wasn't justified.

After threatening to drop his neutral stance in his state's Dem primary in reaction to recent comments by Hillary and Bill about race, South Carolina Rep. James Clyburn confirmed last night that he will remain neutral, after all:

On Friday evening, Mr. Clyburn, who is traveling overseas, issued a statement saying he intended to remain neutral in the early race. Mr. Clyburn, who aides said spoke with Mr. Clinton and Mr. Obama, said he wanted to make sure all candidates had an equal opportunity.

“I encourage the candidates to be sensitive about the words they use,” Mr. Clyburn said “This is an historic race for America to have such strong, diverse candidates vying for the Democratic nomination.”

Clyburn released a statement last night that you can read after the jump. Despite Clyburn's neutrality, there is a very real backlash underway in the black community towards the Clintons for their recent remarks that could present a real problem for Hillary, and her campaign is working overtime to repair the damage.

Separately, in some good news for Obama, The New York Times reports that the New York primary is shaping up as the most competitive one in 15 years, a show of Obama's surprising strength in Hillary's home state.

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This is pretty interesting. Check out what an Obama spokesperson said to The Politico about the backlash that's brewing in the black community to Hillary's recent Martin Luther King assertion and Bill's "fairy-tale" comment:

“A cross-section of voters are alarmed at the tenor of some of these statements,” said Obama spokeswoman Candice Tolliver, who said that Clinton would have to decide whether she owed anyone an apology.

“There’s a groundswell of reaction to these comments — and not just these latest comments but really a pattern, or a series of comments that we’ve heard for several months,” she said. “Folks are beginning to wonder: Is this really an isolated situation or is there something bigger behind all of this?”

What is this "pattern," this "something bigger," that the Obama spokesperson is suggesting might be lurking behind the Clinton comments? Anyone know what this is a reference to?

An anonymous Clinton adviser made an interesting comment to The Guardian, explaining the difference between Hillary supporters and Obama supporters.

"If you have a social need, you're with Hillary," the aide said. "If you want Obama to be your imaginary hip black friend and you're young and you have no social needs, then he's cool."

(ed.note: TPM Media Editor & Publisher Josh Marshall wrote the following about our efforts to accurately and soberly report on this rapidly escalating controversy over race and the Clinton and Obama campaigns.)

Hillary Clinton has a new ad in Nevada and South Carolina, using footage from her New Hampshire victory speech:

Ben Smith notes that the ad is "a radical departure from her ad campaign so far. Not a single policy point, no floating words 'til the end. And the tag line is new: 'It's about people.'"

In other words, this ad is meant to show off her human side, not the policy wonk — perhaps on the thinking that it worked really well in New Hampshire.

The new SurveyUSA poll of Florida shows John McCain jumping into the lead here in the aftermath of his New Hampshire comeback. Here are the numbers, compared to their last poll from early December:

McCain 27% (+16)
Giuliani 19% (-13)
Huckabee 17% (+1)
Romney 17% (+2)
Thompson 8% (-6)

With numbers like this, McCain has to be considered to have the inside track for the nomination.

Bill Clinton just appeared on Al Sharpton's radio show, and was asked about his statements in New Hampshire that the media was pushing a "fairy tale" about Obama's candidacy. Bill insisted that he did not mean Obama's candidacy itself was the fairy tale.

"I have given hundreds of speeches on Hillary's behalf in this campaign," Bill said. "I don't believe I've ever given a single one where I haven't applauded Senator Obama and his candidacy. It's not a fairy tale — he might win."

Instead, Bill said, the "fairy tale" is the idea that Obama has always opposed the war. "We went through 15 debates and the Obama campaign has made the argument that his relative lack of service in the Senate was not relevant because he had better judgment than the other Democrats on the Iraq War..." Bill said. "And I pointed out that he'd never been asked about his statements in 2004 that he didn't know how he'd have voted on the Iraq War, and that there was no significant difference between his position as President Bush's."

Bill then speculated on what Obama might have meant at the time — perhaps he only disagreed with the conduct of the war, or how best to deal with it now. "The point is, it disproves the argument that he was always against it, everyone else was wrong and he was right..." Bill said. "I said, that story is a fairy tale, and that doesn't have anything to do with my respect for him as a person or as a political figure in this campaign."

Obama has said during this campaign that he hedged on his answer about the Iraq War authorization vote because he did not want to openly disagree with John Kerry and John Edwards, as they were the party's ticket at the national convention where he was speaking, and both of whom had voted for the war and yet to repudiate it.

Mitt Romney has a new TV spot up in Michigan, talking about how he grew up in Michigan and how important it is for him that the state do well. The ad also shows pictures of Romney as a small child alongside his late father George, who served as governor of the state back in the 60s.

With lines like this, the ad might have actually been effective if he were running for governor: "We need new leaders with the experience and energy to turn us around. Let's invest in the future with new technology and innovation and unleash the power of Michigan."

This has already gotten some attention, but we wanted to flag it anyway. Today's Times has a good piece on the backlash that's growing towards Mike Bloomberg's suggestions that he may run or may not run for President.

We wanted to point you towards this priceless quote from Democratic strategist Robert Zimmerman, who is a Hillary supporter:

“I think it is becoming a very old story very fast. Mike Bloomberg has failed to make a case that he represents an independent movement, as opposed to a former Democratic liberal, former Republican, former Bush-backer running a campaign of opportunism.”

This really is the point. Bloomberg, who has criticized all the candidates for lacking policy specifics, has simply not said a darn thing that lets us place him in an ideological or policy sense. He is for "bipartisanship" in all its platitudinous glory, without telling us what policy ends he thinks should be accomplished with that bipartisanship.

Which raises another point: Bloomberg's condemnation of "partisanship" needs to be seen as an electoral strategy, rather than a governmental one. That's what he used to get around the Democratic Party in New York, and it's what he would use to get around the parties should he run for President. As Zimmerman says, this is all about opportunism, pure and simple.

John McCain has a new ad up in Michigan, touting the endorsements of both the Detroit News and the Detroit Free Press, the biggest newspapers in the state.

The endorsements stress two key McCain themes — that not only is he best candidate for the office of president, but he's the most electable Republican, too.

A new SurveyUSA poll has some bad news for Rudy Giuliani and his big-state strategy: He's only three points ahead of John McCain in his home state of New York:

Giuliani 32%
McCain 29%
Huckabee 12%
Romney 7%
Thompson 6%

New York's Republican primary is winner-take-all — so if McCain rides his momentum and gets a plurality here, Rudy won't get any of the state's roughly 100 elected delegates.

John Edwards has a new ad in South Carolina, pitching his populist message. The ad shows Edwards speaking a to a multi-racial crowd, talking about his own working-class background:

"I'm running for president because of 54 years of my life," Edwards says, "I have believed to my soul that the men and women who worked in that mill with my father were worth every bit as much as the man who owned that mill."

Check out this little nugget from the campaign trail in Nevada, as per the Las Vegas Review Journal:

Clinton implied that Obama's career has mostly been spent running for office rather than governing.

"He was a part-time state senator for a few years, and then he came to the Senate and immediately started running for president," she said. "And that's his prerogative. That's his right. But I think it is important to compare and contrast our records."

I haven't heard the "part time" line before. It suggests that Hillary is going to keep going with her "experience" frame, and that the sharp elbows are still out, even though Hillary isn't perceived to be behind right now.

If people were expecting the Democratic race to get down and dirty — keeping in mind those pre-New Hampshire reports that Hillary's backers would set up a 527 to go after Obama — that might not be the plan, after all. The New York Sun reports that the Hillary camp is likely to scrap plans for negative ads, at least until Super Tuesday

"I would be very wary of being the first to draw blood," said John Lapp, a Dem ad maker who is not affiliated with any of the campaigns. "You have such an advantage doing the response, being able to call the other person negative, and then you go ahead and lower the boom."

Barack Obama has picked up the endorsement of a major female politician, and one that could be useful in the Nevada caucuses at that. The Arizona Republic reports that Gov. Janet Napolitano — herself a former U.S. Attorney during Bill Clinton's administration — will endorse Obama at a campaign event tonight in Las Vegas.

The endorsement could be of some benefit out in Western states, where Napolitano is a popular governor and can advance the argument that he is the more electable candidate. The endorsement could also help Obama build some support with women voters in Arizona's February 5 primary.

A big development in the South Carolina Dem primary: Rep. James Clyburn is suggesting that he may drop his neutral stance, largely out of dismay over the now-notorious comments made by Hillary about Martin Luther King. The Times reports:

Mr. Clyburn, a veteran of the civil rights movement and a power in state Democratic politics, put himself on the sidelines more than a year ago to help secure an early primary for South Carolina, saying he wanted to encourage all candidates to take part. But he said recent remarks by the Clintons that he saw as distorting civil rights history could change his mind.

“We have to be very, very careful about how we speak about that era in American politics,” said Mr. Clyburn, who was shaped by his searing experiences as a youth in the segregated South and his own activism in those days.

The thing is, though, that there's some disagreement about what Hillary actually said or meant. This is not at all to defend Hillary's comments -- they were clumsy and inartful, and she later backtracked. And in many ways an endorsement of Obama by Clyburn would make sense on its own terms. It just seems surprising that Clyburn would be basing his re-evaluation of Hillary based almost entirely on this one remark.

Rudy has a new ad out running on Fox News — where it premiered during a break in last night's debate — and in Florida, where he's making a push as part of his big-state strategy. In the ad, Rudy promises historic tax cuts:

"On his first day in office," the announcer promises, "Rudy Giuliani will send Congress the largest tax cut in American history."

• Last night's debate might have been held in South Carolina, but it was just as much a fight for the votes in Michigan, Mitt Romney's native state and the sight of the next Republican primary. Romney condemned McCain: "I know that there are some people who think, as Senator McCain did — he said, you know, some jobs have left Michigan that are never coming back. I disagree. I’m going to fight for every single job. Michigan, South Carolina, every state in this country."

• McCain responded that he was simply telling the truth — implying that Romney doesn't. "One of the reasons why I won in New Hampshire is because I went there and told them the truth," he said. "And sometimes you have to tell people things they don’t want to hear along with things that they do want to hear." Jobs have gone away that aren't coming back, McCain said, but the government can help the citizens through job training and re-education programs.

• One of the most bizarre moments in this debate, or any other debate for that matter, came when Brit Hume pressed the candidates on whether they agreed with the "passive" response of the Navy ships that were confronted by Iranian speedboats in the Strait of Hormuz — the ships threatened to fire on the Iranians if they did not desist in their approach, rather than immediately fire as Hume would prefer.

• The candidates all stood by the decisions of the captains on those ships, despite Hume's repeated urging that they be stronger. Among the top-tier candidates, only McCain came even close to criticizing Hume, calling it "a bit presumptuous" to judge the captains, who trained for a very long time to reach their positions and are trusted to make those judgments.

• Ron Paul took a harder line, comparing this incident to the Gulf of Tonkin and lambasting hawks who want to start a war over it. "Of course we want caution. But I'm worried about the policy of why we're looking for a justification, now there are no weapons, actually people are looking around a for an excuse to bomb Iran. I mean, we're already, with our CIA, being involved in trying to overthrow that government, and we don't need another war. And this incident should not be thrown out of proportion to the point where we're getting ready to attack Iran over this."

• Mitt Romney then fired at Paul with what was likely a pre-rehearsed applause line: "I think Congressman Paul should not be reading as many Ahmadinejad's press releases."

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On the same day that Barack Obama scored the endorsement of John Kerry, he's set to get the support of a decidedly non-establishment Democrat: Ned Lamont.

Lamont has revealed on his Web site that he'll be backing the Illiniois Senator.

Lamont's backing is a decent get for Obama, for several reasons. It could open up more Web fundraising channels to him. And since Lamont has become a national figure among Dem primary voters for his successful primary challenge to Lieberman, Obama can argue the endorsement shows he's the one mounting a true challenge to the Dem establishment.

Here's Lamont making the case himself in a vid he just posted on his site:

From The New York Times's description of the Kerry-Obama endorsement event in South Carolina today:

When the two men embraced, beneath magnolia trees at a sun-splashed rally that drew a sea of people here, it brought the relationship of the men full circle.

Getting hot in here...

TPM Reader HS, who sent this one in, says that this shows that the "feminizing Obama" process is well underway.

I don't know about that, but I will say that the description does call to mind all those pics of Kerry and Edwards embracing that were all over Drudge after Edwards was announced as Veep candidate in 2004.

Separately, speaking of lame media coverage, The Politico's editors published a big mea culpa today about the failures of themselves and the rest of the political media in the run-up to the New Hampshire primary. Our take on it is here.

A new 527 called Victims Voice — set up by one Arkansas Republican, Keith Emis, with the assistance of his new financial backers — is running a truly ferocious new attack ad in South Carolina against Mike Huckabee.

The ad cuts straight to the point in informing viewers of Huck's role in the Wayne Dumond case, and features the mother of one of Dumond's victims blaming Huckabee for her daughter being raped and murdered:

Emis told Election Central that the ad will run tonight on Fox News, during the blocks of time both before and after tonight's Republican debate, and that he has made purchases for other airings of the ad, as well. Emis declined to discuss who his donors were and declined to specify the size of the buy.

Bill Richardson has formally dropped out of the presidential race, at a news conference in Santa Fe.

Below I noted that in the wake of John Kerry's Obama endorsement some Hillary advisers were hoping to secure the support of Kerry's co-Senator from Massachusetts, Ted Kennedy -- something that would take the air out of comparisons between Obama and JFK.

Looks like it might not happen, though. The Huffington Post called up Kennedy's office and got this:

"Senator Kennedy has no plans to get involved at this time," Melissa Wagone, a spokesperson for the Senator, told the Huffington Post. "He has very strong relationships with many of these candidates personally, and has a lot of respect for them."

A bit of wiggle room, but it looks unlikely.

Late Update: I should have been clearer and said that the more likely thing to happen is that he'll come out and pick someone when he/she looks like a foregone conclusion.

John Kerry endorses Obama in South Carolina, says the Illinois Senator has the capacity to "speak out so loudly that Washington has absolutely no choice but to listen."

Kerry also gets off a pretty good joke that's also a poignant reference to his own eloquence deficit, saying: "I was proud to help introduce Barack to the nation when I asked him to speak to our national convention in 2004. Obviously Barack did all the heavy lifting."

A big Hillary Clinton supporter and statewide official in New York might have just given the Hillary campaign a real headache. During an appearance yesterday on talk radio — at almost the same time as Obama co-chair Jesse Jackson Jr. questioned Hillary's tears — New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo used some words with a very troublesome racial history, apparently in reference to Barack Obama.

"It's not a TV crazed race. Frankly you can't buy your way into it," Cuomo said, according to Albany Times Union reporter Rick Karlin. He then added, "You can't shuck and jive at a press conference. All those moves you can make with the press don't work when you're in someone's living room."

According to Joan Houston Hall's Dictionary of American Regional English, the phrase "shuck and jive" means, "To be deceptive or evasive; to tell tall tales or lies; to fool around. esp freq among Black speakers," and "stalling or obfuscating, especially to avoid having to admit that you did not know something or were trying to divert someone's attention."

(Via Ben Smith)

Late Update: Ben Smith hears directly from Cuomo on this and adds this:

Though the report I link refers specifically to New Hampshire, Cuomo called to play the tape of the interview, in which he says nice things about Obama, and in which the quote above is describing both Iowa and New Hampshire -- meaning it's not a direct reference to Clinton's primary victory, or attempt to explain it.

"Barack Obama is a beautiful symbol. He's a powerful speaker. He's a charismatic figure. And what he has to say is important for the Democrats," Cuomo says in the interview, with the New York Post's Fred Dicker.

"It was never about Obama in the first place," Cuomo told me of the use of the phrase, which he said he was using "as a synonym for 'bob and weave.'"

Late Late Update: The Albany Times Union blog, which originally broke this story, adds this update that would appear to suggest that there's less here than meets the eye:

We’ve been getting calls from the Cuomo people on this who want to point out, correctly, that the AG was not referring to Barack Obama when he used the phrase “shuck and jive,” but to what politicians in general do with the media. Cuomo’s point was when candidates meet a substantial proportion of primary voters or caucus goers in person, such as in NH or Iowa, there is a certain genuineness that can be avoided in a big-state media-heavy campaign.

John Kerry's former running mate releases a statement on Kerry's endorsement of Obama:

“Our country and our Party are stronger because of John’s service, and I respect his decision. When we were running against each other and on the same ticket, John and I agreed on many issues. I continue to believe that this election is about the future, not the past, and that the country needs a President who will fight aggressively to end the status quo and change the Washington system and to give voice to all of those whose voices are ignored in the corridors of power.”

Its worth pointing out again that a Kerry endorsement of Edwards was just never in the cards, since the two were at odds during the 2004 race and Edwards publicly criticized the Kerry campaign's handling of the race after it was all over.

Mitt Romney has a new radio ad up in Michigan, featuring Congressman Pete Hoekstra and his wife Diane. The Hoekstras tell voters in a friendly, folksy manner about Romney's conservative stances on abortion, gay marriage, and reducing federal spending — and they of course play up Romney's roots in the state, dubbing his policy stances "Michigan values."

Interestingly, the ad does not discuss illegal immigration, which has previously been Romney's biggest wedge issue against John McCain.

The ad is available after the jump.

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This morning's Rasmussen poll in South Carolina, conducted yesterday, does not show a post-New Hampshire bounce for Hillary Clinton. Instead, Barack Obama leads by the same margin as he did in the Rasmussen poll conducted on Sunday:

Obama 42% (+0)
Clinton 30% (+0)
Edwards 15% (+1)

A new Rasmussen poll in South Carolina shows John McCain enjoying a post-New Hampshire bounce, grabbing a narrow lead over Mike Huckabee. Here are the numbers, compared to the poll conducted this past Sunday:

McCain 27% (+7)
Huckabee 24% (-4)
Romney 16% (+1)
Thompson 12% (+1)
Giuliani 6% (-4)
Paul 5% (+1)

Hillary Clinton's campaign announced some big endorsements today, one from retired Army General and former presidential candidate Wesley Clark, the other from Michigan U.S. Senator Debbie Stabenow.

"Never before have so many Americans had our well-being so closely tied to world events," Clark said in a statement on his PAC's Web site. "Our economic and national security has become more complicated than ever before, and we deserve a leader who draws on wisdom, compassion, intelligence and moral courage — in short, we need Hillary Clinton."

"Hillary Clinton has the experience required to walk into the Oval Office on day one and start delivering the type of change our country needs," Stabenow said in a Clinton campaign press release. "She understands the challenges facing our working families, and she has fought her entire life to make sure they have the tools they need to achieve the American Dream."

John Kerry will endorse Barack Obama, the Associated Press is reporting, quoting an unnamed source.

Late Update: Kerry and Obama will be making an appearance together today in Charleston, South Carolina, MSNBC reports. --gs

Late Update: The Obama campaign has just confirmed Kerry's endorsement to me. --gs

Late Update: The cable nets are already portraying this as a "major blow" to John Edwards. But this is just silly. No one expected Kerry to endorse Edwards -- the two fell out in a big way after Edwards publicly questioned Kerry's handling of the 2004 race.

In particular, Edwards claimed that he had wanted to hit back harder against the Swift Boat Vets attacks. A Kerry endorsement of Edwards just wasn't going to happen. --gs

Late Update: Now that Kerry has backed Obama, the next big endorsement question looming over the campaigns is this. --gs

Late Update: Edwards responds.

Rudy Giuliani has a new ad in Florida, a state that is central to his big-state strategy — which practically no observers think can succeed — asking voters to ignore what the pundits have to say about who's actually winning, and instead think about the issues:

"The media loves process. Talking heads love chatter," the announcer says. "But Florida has a chance to turn down the noise. And show the world that leadership is what really matters."

A new poll of Michigan by Republican firm Strategic Vision gives John McCain the lead with 29%. Behind are native son Mitt Romney at 20%, Mike Huckabee with 18%, Rudy Giuliani at 13%, and Fred Thompson and Ron Paul at 5% each.

The poll was conducted January 4-6, before McCain's win in New Hampshire. McCain also has the advantage of having won the Michigan primary in 2000.

The Associated Press is reporting that Bill Richardson is dropping out of the race for president, and will make his announcement tomorrow. In yesterday's New Hampshire primary, Richardson only won 5% of the vote.

It remains to be seen what impact, if any, this will have on the Latino vote in next Saturday's Nevada caucuses, and also whether Richardson will endorse any of the three remaining major candidates.

In order to better understand last night's Democratic primary, you really need to check out this map of the results made by Nicholas Beaudrot:

(Click picture to enlarge.)

The towns that went for Hillary Clinton are in shades of green, while Barack Obama's towns are in shades of purple. Beaudrot's interpretation is that Obama put together a "'Bill Bradley Plus Coalition': wealthy liberals, young voters, people of color, and as many middle class ($50,000-$100,000) voters as you can get."

Of course, Bill Bradley also lost the New Hampshire primary when he ran. And in Obama's case, there weren't any minority voters in sufficient numbers who could have given him that extra push over the top.

A new poll of Michigan from Democratic firm The Rossman Group finds a close three-way race on the Republican side, with Mike Huckabee at 23%, Mitt Romney 21%, and John McCain 18%. Further back are Rudy Giuliani at 8%, Fred Thompson with 4%, and Ron Paul at 3%.

On the Democratic side, where neither Barack Obama nor John Edwards will be on the ballot due to the disputes between the state and national parties, the results are Hillary Clinton 48% to "Uncommitted" with 28%.

The poll was conducted January 6-7.

Mitt Romney's back is clearly against the wall after his losses in Iowa and New Hampshire, and he's become more choosy about where he's spending his money. The campaign is now pulling their ads in South Carolina and Florida.

Instead, Romney will be focusing all those resources on next week's primary in Michigan, the state where Romney was born and raised, and where his late father was governor. "We feel the best strategy is to focus our paid messaging in Michigan," Romney spokesman Kevin Madden told the Associated Press.

Mitt Romney's campaign has put out a new memo/press release in the wake of his second-place loss in New Hampshire, making the case that he's not licked yet and in fact has "a clear path to victory going forward." Notably, the release points out John McCain's weaker performance among core Republicans, arguing that this will catch up to him in later, more exclusively-Republican contests:

Note that Gov. Romney actually beat John McCain among Republicans yesterday (35%-34%) and most of the upcoming primaries and caucuses attract an electorate far more Republican than New Hampshire's. Yesterday's results also show that most independents will choose the Democratic ballot in open primary states.

The full release is available after the jump.

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One particular pollster, New Hampshire-based American Research Group, has perhaps the most interesting explanation for how they got their state's Democratic result wrong. ARG put up a statement up on their site, saying the following:

While we missed the final number that Clinton would make in New Hampshire, our polling was one of only two daily polls that showed Clinton regaining support following her drop in New Hampshire the day after the Iowa Democratic caucus. Clinton was moving up in the final days and hours before the primary, and our polls and the Rasmussen polls were the only daily polls to catch Clinton's rebound.

...

Our polls missed the final Clinton number, but we did not miss the strong swing back among women reacting favorably to Clinton that started after the debate and continued with her comments in Portsmouth. We did not have a polling problem, we just ran out of time.

It is true, actually that ARG showed Hillary closing the gap. Their second-to-last poll had her down by 11 points — while the final one had her down by 9. Keep in mind that these were not composites of samples over three days, as in the case of John Zogby, but were instead conducted over 24-hour periods.

Congratulations, ARG.

Mike Huckabee has a new TV spot up in Michigan, pitching himself as the working-class conservative who understands the average Michigan voter's problems:

Conspicuously, Huckabee uses the line that many have taken to be a shot at Michigan's native son Mitt Romney, who is relying heavily on this state for his comeback: "I'm Mike Huckabee, and I approved this message, because I believe most Americans want their next president to remind them of the guy they work with — not the guy who laid them off."

The Tears are now officially an issue in Campaign 2008.

Obama's national campaign co-chair, Jesse Jackson, Jr., just went on MSNBC and appeared to question Hillary's tears, which he called "tears that melted the Granite State," adding that those tears "moved voters."

He also suggested that Hillary was crying about "her appearance."

Take a look...

Here's one key quote:

...there were tears that melted the Granite State. And those are tears that Mrs. Clinton cried on that day, clearly moved voters. She somehow connected with those voters.

But those tears also have to be analyzed. They have to be looked at very, very carefully in light of Katrina, in light of other things that Mrs. Clinton did not cry for, particularly as we head to South Carolina where 45% of African-Americans who participate in the Democratic contest, and they see real hope in Barack Obama.

And:

We saw something very clever in the last week of this campaign coming out of Iowa, going into New Hampshire, we saw a sensitivity factor. Something that Mrs. Clinton has not been able to do with voters that she tried in New Hampshire.

Not in response to voters -- not in response to Katrina, not in response to other issues that have devastated the American people, the war in Iraq, we saw tears in response to her appearance. So her appearance brought her to tears, but not hurricane Katrina.

Asked if he was suggesting that The Tears were faked, Jackson said: "I wouldn't say that."

So it appears that Jackson's point is that Hillary hasn't proven able to show the same level of emotion about the problems facing our country that she did in response to a question about her looks.

This has already gotten a bit of attention, but it's worth a look. The Obama campaign has a new campaign memo out from campaign manager David Plouffe that contains some new fundraising numbers, offers the campaign's take on yesterday's loss and lays out the game plan for the days ahead.

On the campaign's loss, the memo says that the Obama camp succeeded in "taking the once inevitable frontrunner down to the wire in her firewall state."

On fundraising:

In the 4th Quarter of 2007, our campaign raised $23.5 million – over $22.5 million of which is for the primary election. In that quarter, we added 111,000 new donors for a total of 475,000 donors in 2007.

In the first 8 days of 2008, we raised over $8 million and gained 35,000 new donors. Since midnight last night, we have raised another $500,000 online.

Full memo, including staffing detail and the Obama camp's view of the coming primaries, after the jump.

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Amidst all the hand-wringing by pollsters over how they managed to get New Hampshire so amazingly wrong, John Zogby has put out a press release containing an interesting piece of information: The last one-day sample of his three-day tracking poll showed Hillary closing the gap in a big way -- but the sample was too small to be published on its own:

My polling showed Clinton doing well on the late Sunday night and all day Monday – she was in a 2-point race in that portion of the polling. But since our methods call for a three-day rolling average, we had to legitimately factor the huge Obama numbers on Friday and Saturday – thus his 12 point average lead. Unfortunately, one day or a day–and–a–half does not make a trend and we ran out of time.

Okay, so Zogby's got his story, and he's sticking to it. But what's the excuse for all the other polls that were using one or two-day samples? That list includes American Research Group, Suffolk and Marist — and they got it wrong, too.

Hillary hit the morning shows today to tout her victory, and on NBC's Today Show she said that the turning point came when she hit back emotionally at Obama and Edwards during the Saturday debate:

"It was the first time that the leading candidates actually were asked some very pointed questions about what we stand for, what we’ve done to help other people, what our accomplishments are and what we want to do for the future."

As we noted below, the exit polls show that Hillary gained ground on Obama by doing well among voters who made their decision in the last few days, suggesting a major role for the debate.

But the exit polls also show that Hillary did even better among voters who made their decision yesterday. This suggests that the The Tears allowed her to "win the final news cycle," as the political pros like to put it, and that this was perhaps at least as instrumental as the debate in helping her win, as galling as that is.

So what should we make of John McCain's New Hampshire victory last night? What does it suggest for McCain about the road ahead?

Unquestionably, it left the GOP race wide open, gave a new credibility to McCain's once-moribund candidacy, and put him back on a track that could lead to the nomination. Nonetheless, a close look at the exit polls and the demographics of his victory reveals that a host of hidden dangers lie ahead for him in the upcoming primary and caucus states.

For one thing, McCain's percentages of both the Republican and independent voting blocs were lower than they were in 2000, according to CNN's exit polls. That year he won 38% of the Republican vote and 62% of the independent vote, for a 49% victory overall. This year, it was only 34% of the GOPers and 40% of the indies, for 37% overall.

This is significant for the upcoming races because he'll need GOP base support in upcoming Republican-only primaries in many states — and suggests that his work on immigration reform, among other things, has significantly eroded his support among that demographic. It also suggests that his traction with independent voters wasn't what it was in 2000 — a key constituency for McCain in other states.

And that's not all.

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Here are a couple of interesting numbers from the exit polls that shed a bit of light on Hillary's surprise victory over Obama last night.

Among voters who made up their minds yesterday, Hillary beat Obama by 39%-36%, suggesting that the last news cycle of the contest might have played a decisive role in shifting votes Hillary's way. Yes, I admit it -- I'm talking mainly about the wall-to-wall coverage of The Tears, which were effectively the last close look at Hillary these voters had before entering the voting booths.

Meanwhile, among voters who made up their minds in the last three days, Hillary also gained ground, coming in only one point behind Obama, 36%-37% -- numbers that are way out of sync with the big lead Obama had in polls over the weekend and yesterday.

Since Hillary had a relatively solid lead of 41%-37% over Obama among voters who had already made up their minds before last weekend, the late-deciding voters enabled her to regain enough ground to win.

Although Barack Obama narrowly lost in New Hampshire, he's going full steam ahead in Nevada, where the Jan. 19 caucus will be the next major Democratic contest. That state's 17,500-member SEIU local has voted to endorse him, and he's also expected to pick up the support of the 60,000-member Culinary Workers Union today.

Those union votes are definitely a blow to John Edwards, who has built his campaign on the strength of organized labor, but seen Obama overtake him as the anti-Hillary candidate.

So keep an eye on Nevada. For Obama, it will be his next chance to get an edge on Hillary. And for Hillary, it will be her chance to beat Obama and fully regain control of this whole process.

Late Update: The Culinary Workers endorsement was made official this afternoon.

Hillary spokesman Howard Wolfson went on MSNBC moments ago and articulated the Hillary camp's spin on her victory: New Hampshire voters saw the real Hillary, and "they liked what they saw."

This is going beyond just her Tears moment. Camp Hillary is saying that in a variety of ways -- at the debate on Saturday, where Hillary hit back emotionally against John Edwards and Barack Obama; and in Hillary's willingness to engage reporters in question and answer sessions over the last few days -- Hillary has revealed herself in new ways to voters, and it's paid off.

The relief in the Hillary campaign is palpable tonight. This might be not only because she won, but because the campaign has solved a larger problem: They've been searching for a way to introduce the real Hillary to voters, and now that she has finally opened up to them -- both by design and by accident -- the voters decided that they liked her.

Hillary may have won tonight, upending the calculus of just about everyone, but John Edwards wants you to know that he's going to be part of the equation no matter what -- in his concession speech tonight, he says there's no way he's not staying in the race through the convention:

In a major upset, Hillary wins the New Hampshire primary, says MSNBC and the Associated Press.

More in a sec.

Late Update: It had absolutely nothing to do with The Tears.

With 61% reporting, it's:

Hillary 39%

Obama 36%

Edwards 17%

No, it's not because of The Tears.

With 52% reporting, it's:

Hillary 39%

Obama 37%

Edwards 17%

The pundits are saying that Hillary's stronger-than-expected showing thus far is all because of The Tears. I'm going to suggest that it has little to nothing to do with this at all. Discuss.

With 42% reporting, the race is tightening:

Hillary 39%

Obama 37%

Edwards 17%

With 32% reporting, it's:

Hillary 40%

Obama 36%

Edwards 17%

With one-fifth reporting, the numbers:

Clinton -- 22,468 -- 40%

Obama -- 20,193 -- 36%

Edwards -- 9,494 -- 17%

John McCain is projected to win the New Hampshire primary, according to MSNBC, ABC and Fox News.

It's hard to overstate how devastating a blow this is to Mitt Romney's candidacy. Recall that his whole game plan was to win both Iowa and New Hampshire, victories which would propel him all the way to the nomination. And indeed Romney's campaign had managed to convince the political press that he was pulling off a late surge in New Hampshire.

But he lost. After sinking huge sums into both the key early states -- both of which were key to his strategy -- he lost the two of them. Unclear where Mitt goes from here.

Prediction: With Rudy and Romney slowly disappearing, McCain will re-emerge as the establishment GOP candidate soon. Stay tuned.

Okay, I know everyone wants numbers. So, with 10 percent reporting, Hillary is ahead:

Clinton -- 12,282 -- 38%

Obama -- 11,579 -- 36%

Edwards -- 5,414 -- 17%

Among Republicans, McCain is projected to win the NH primary, according to Fox News and MSNBC. More in a bit.

The changes in Hillary's campaign staff in the wake of her travails are underway -- and every tiny sign of movement is being pounced on by reporters.

The Washington Post reports that longtime Hillary confidante Maggie Williams is set to come in and occupy a role akin to campaign manager. No sign yet of what this means for current manager and equally loyal Hillary confidante Patti Solis Doyle.

Meanwhile, The Times reports that a long-time Clinton pal, Texas advertising exec Roy Spence, is being brought in to do...something or other. The Times also gives us a great deal of detail about an allegedly significant conference call that's supposed to happen sometime after tonight's primary.

Suffice it to say that this is some pretty fine-grained reporting. But I suppose it does tell us that the Hillary staff shakeup is sort of underway.

Here's a picture of how the independent votes are shaking out in New Hampshire.

Election Central just spoke to Paul Bergeron, the city clerk for the state's second-largest city, Nashua. Bergeron told us that independent voters are breaking much more for the Democrats than the Republicans when they're requesting ballots, and as a result many of the wards have called him up to ask for more Dem ballots to be delivered.

The story about ballots running low isn't a sign of being unprepared per se — rather, the separate party ballots were originally distributed based on estimates of past voting behavior for each primary, with more than enough to handle a huge turnout. But with independents voting Democratic by huge margins, they've ended up out-stripping the initial supply of Dem ballots that had been given out under those assumptions.

Who are the beneficiaries of this?

On the Democratic side, it's Barack Obama, who has squarely beaten Hillary Clinton among independents in all the opinion polls. For the Republicans, the winner would be Mitt Romney — because he wants indies moving out of the Republican primary and away from John McCain.

Hillary campaign co-chair Terry McAuliffe goes on MSNBC, seems to declare that the campaign's top officials will stay aboard in some capacity: "Everyone who is in the campaign today will be in the campaign," he says.

But he does say that the campaign will be bringing in more people, and won't say whether they'll be the new bosses, suggesting a possible shake-up is on the way...

This is interesting. The Huffington Post had a blockbuster scoop today reporting that top independent expenditure groups backing Hillary are thinking of creating a massive anti-Obama "527 committee" to go after the Illinois Senator.

But two major players in this world are already moving rapidly to disavow any involvement in any such effort.

ASFCME president Gerald McEntee's office sends over the following statement:

"We’re not about the business of swift-boating any Democratic candidate. We will not be party to any kind of effort of this type. Our campaign is about promoting Hillary Clinton – not tearing down any other candidate. Our number one priority is having the strongest Democratic candidate to take back the White House in November."

The background to this is interesting, too. As you may recall, McEntee, who backs Hillary, has already taken lots of heat from the heads of ASFCME locals for the union's campaign against Obama.

But McEntee is a Hillary backer, so he'll presumably be playing some role in the primary going forward, which explains why his statement doesn't rule out any activity at all. That McEntee has to aggressively vow to engage in no negative activity suggests the dilemma McEntee now faces as Obama wins over members of his union.

Meanwhile, Emily's List, which also supports Hillary, has released this:

We are absolutely not setting up a 527 to engage in the presidential primary. We have a proven mode of engagement in elections via our WOMEN VOTE! program and we are proud of the work WOMEN VOTE! has done for more than a decade to engage and mobilize women voters to help elect Democrats up and down the ballot.”

All in all, it's yet another measure of the protectiveness of Obama that his candidacy has awakened among his supporters -- something that could make Hillary allies like these reluctant to go after him as aggressively as might be necessary.

Late Update: The American Federation of Teachers also denies they're on board with this.

For those of you who haven't seen this yet, Bill Clinton unloaded big time on the media's treatment of his wife yesterday -- prompting a big debate over the question of who is to blame for Hillary's travails, herself or the media.

Our take on this argument is right here.

Voter turnout for the New Hampshire primary is happening more rapidly than anyone had previously expected — so much, in fact, that the Secretary of State's office has gotten requests from various towns to send more ballots, before they run out.

"The towns that are calling now are experiencing heavy turnout, and see their piles of ballots starting to drop at a rate faster than they're comfortable with," Deputy Secretary of State Dave Scanlan told MSNBC. "They're also stating to us that it's the Democratic ballots that have them more concerned than the Republican ballots."

Fox News just reported that James Carville and Paul Begala will be re-entering the Clinton orbit by coming in to work for Hillary as senior campaign volunteers as early as tomorrow -- the idea being that they're being brought in to right Ship Hillary in the wake of.her Iowa loss and possible New Hampshire one.

The storyline of choice here, obviously, is that Bill's Bad Boys of 1992 are riding back in to rescue his wife from electoral disaster.

I just reached Carville on his cell. Here's what he had to say about this:

"Fox was, is and will continue to be an asinine and ignorant network. I have not spoken to anyone in the Clinton campaign about this. I have not done domestic political consulting since President Clinton was elected. I'm not getting back into domestic political consulting. If I do go back, it would be safe to say that I'm the biggest liar in America."

Asked if he knew whether Begala would be coming back, Carville continued:

"To the extent that I know anything, as of nine this morning, no he is not."

Oh, well. There goes that narrative.

Late Update: Ben Smith gets a denial from Begala, too: "As I say to the boys: N.H.D. Not Happenin' Dude."

Today's Suffolk poll gives Mitt Romney a four-point lead over John McCain in the New Hampshire primary — but they are the last poll to do so. Here are the final numbers, compared to the ones from yesterday:

Romney 30% (+0)
McCain 26% (-1)
Huckabee 13% (+4)
Giuliani 11% (+1)
Paul 5% (-3)

We'll all find out tonight whether they were on to something or not.

Today's Suffolk University tracking poll is out, and they give Barack Obama a healthy five-point lead over Hillary Clinton in the New Hampshire primary. Here are the numbers, compared to yesterday's Suffolk poll:

Obama 39% (+4)
Clinton 34% (+0)
Edwards 15% (+0)

Throughout this cycle, Suffolk was often something of an outlier in giving Hillary Clinton especially high levels of support. As such, could this poll be understating her deficit?

New Hampshire's flagship newspaper has just posted a report saying that massive turnout is already in evidence around the state.

Since posting about the weather in the early primary states is all the rage these days on blogs covering the presidential race, here's the weather today in Manchester, NH:

Cloudy

44 degrees

Feels like 44 degrees

So it's unseasonably warm, which probably helps explain the high turnout, something that conventional wisdom dictates will help Obama.

But let's not stop there. Weather.com also tells us these facts, too:

UV Index: 0 Low

Wind: CALM

Humidity: 79%

Pressure: 30.12 in.

Dew Point: 38°F

Visibility: 10.0 miles

So while it's true that it's very humid in New Hampshire today, there's no wind and high visibility -- which is to say, expect especially high turnout today . (Yes, that's a joke.)

Are you planning on looking for the exit polls tonight out of New Hampshire, but uncertain how much stock to place in them or how to avoid getting duped by inaccuracies?

Pollster.com's Mark Blumenthal comes through with a handy guide to get you through the night.

The final Rasmussen tracking poll for the New Hampshire primary gives John McCain a one-point lead against Mitt Romney — a departure from most polls that give him a more substantial edge. Here are the numbers, compared to the ones released yesterday:

McCain 32% (+0)
Romney 31% (+0)
Huckabee 10% (-1)
Giuliani 8% (-2)
Paul 8% (+0)

The final Rasmussen tracking poll for the New Hampshire primary is out, and like all others it shows Barack Obama on the cusp of defeating Hillary Clinton. Here are the numbers, compared to yesterday's:

Obama 37% (-1)
Clinton 30% (+2)
Edwards 19% (+1)
Richardson 8% (+0)

Today's Zogby tracking poll in New Hampshire, the last one before the primary, shows John McCain well-positioned to win the Republican primary. Here are the numbers, compared to yesterday's:

McCain 36% (+2)
Romney 27% (-2)
Huckabee 10% (+0)
Giuliani (+0)
Paul 9% (+3)

Commentary from John Zogby:

McCain opens up his lead, though Romney had a good day. But the 3-day average favors McCain. He leads big among Independents, though Paul is beginning to draw some of the Indies’ support and is now polling double digits again in the North – taking votes away from McCain. Paul does very well among 18-29 year olds. McCain also leads among Republicans, men and women, Moderates, and Conservatives. Again, a good day for Romney, but will he have enough time?

The final Zogby tracking poll of the New Hampshire primary, out this morning, gives Barack Obama an overwhelming lead. Here the numbers, compared to yesterday's tracking poll:

Obama 42% (+3)
Clinton 29% (+0)
Edwards 17% (-2)
Richardson 5% (-1)

Some commentary from John Zogby: "Obama’s margin over Clinton has opened up. He leads among all groups except women and voters over 65. In a development that could prove significant in later closed-primary states, Obama has pulled ahead among Democrats 40% to 34% — as he did in Iowa in the closing hours."

The village of Hart's Location, New Hampshire, has reported its presidential results closing the polls with 100% turnout, shortly after Dixville Notch did the same. The numbers:

Democrats:
Obama 9
Clinton 3
Edwards 1

Republicans:
McCain 6
Huckabee 5
Paul 4
Romney 1

As with Dixville Notch, it's important to note that the results don't necessarily foretell an outcome. For example, Wesley Clark won both villages in the 2004 primary, while coming in way behind John Kerry and Howard Dean statewide.

Believe it or not, the first results of the New Hampshire primary are officially in. The small village of Dixville Notch has closed its polls after 100% of voters turned out, as is allowed under state law, and here are the results:

Democrats:
Obama 7
Edwards 2
Richardson 1

Republicans:
McCain 4
Romney 2
Giuliani 1

That's right, a total of 17 votes. The village has done this in every election since 1960, and since 1996 has had something of an informal competition with another village, Hart's Location, over who will finish voting and report the results first.

The results are not necessarily predictive of anything — Wesley Clark won both localities in the 2004 primary, while coming in a distant third overall. One thing that is striking, however, is that more people voted in the Democratic primary in a village that has historically voted heavily Republican for the general elections, and that the crossover votes went decisively to Obama.

The new Rasmussen poll has Mike Huckabee opening up a lead in South Carolina, albeit not as big as the one in today's SurveyUSA poll. Here are the numbers, compared to their last poll from three weeks ago:

Huckabee 28% (+5)
McCain 21% (+9)
Romney 15% (-8)
Thompson 11% (-1)
Giuliani 10% (-1)

Here's Hillary's two-minute closer on New Hampshire TV -- which hits the campaign's point that she will be ready to lead the nation "on day one" not once, but twice:

Check out this new mailer -- forwarded our way by a Dem operative -- that Hillary has dropped in New Hampshire, attacking Obama on Social Security taxes (click on below images to enlarge):

As the Obama campaign has argued in response to previous Hillary attacks on this topic, this involves Obama's proposal to create a "donut" in the taxable income for Social Security payroll taxes, which as of this year's indexation would affect people making over $102,000 per year -- something akin to keeping the current cap, creating a "donut" to a $200,000 or $250,000, and then taxing income above that level at the same rate.

Getting rid of the cap completely would indeed raise revenues by $1 trillion or more, but over the next ten years, according to both the centrist Tax Policy Center and the right-wing Heritage Foundation.

There just one problem: Obama has only proposed raising the cap, not scrapping it.

Late Update: It's worth highlighting some of the phrases in this mailer. "New Hampshire families need to keep more of their hard-earned dollars -- not less..."

And: "We need a President that will help hard-working families keep more of what they earn..."

There's also a reference to New Hampshire families sending more of their "hard-earned dollars to Washington."

Noted without comment.

The new SurveyUSA poll shows Mike Huckabee posting a huge lead in South Carolina, with nearly double the support of his nearest competitor. Here are the numbers, compared to the last poll from December 20:

Huckabee 36% (+8)
Romney 19% (-1)
McCain 17% (+1)
Thompson 11% (-4)
Giuliani 9% (-3)

The new SurveyUSA poll in South Carolina shows some huge movement for Barack Obama. Here are the numbers, compared to the last poll released December 19:

Obama 50% (+11)
Clinton 30% (-11)
Edwards 16% (-1)

Obama's share of the black vote has jumped from 57% up to 69%, and his share of the white vote from 18% to 29%.

The new CNN/University of New Hampshire poll gives John McCain a narrow but steady lead over Mitt Romney in the primary. Here are the numbers, compared to the preliminary figures released last night:

McCain 31% (-1)
Romney 26% (+0)
Huckabee 13% (-1)
Giuliani 10% (-1)
Paul 10% (+0)

Today's CNN/University of New Hampshire poll shows Barack Obama with a strong and stable lead on the eve of the crucial primary. Here are the numbers, compared to the preliminary numbers released last night:

Obama 39% (+0)
Clinton 30% (+1)
Edwards 16% (+0)
Richardson 7% (+0)

The Obama bounce has spread to South Carolina, as well. Here's the new Rasmussen poll, compared to their last poll from only three weeks ago:

Obama 42% (+9)
Clinton 30% (-3)
Edwards 14% (-3)

Obama's share of the black vote has jumped from 50% to 58%. His leap with white voters is even great, but starting from a lower point — he has gone from 14% up to 27%.

The new Gallup poll shows that Mike Huckabee is enjoying his post-Iowa bounce, now taking the lead among Republicans nationwide. Here are the numbers, compared to the last poll in mid-December:

Huckabee 25% (+9)
Giuliani 20% (-7)
McCain 19% (+5)
Thompson 12% (-2)
Romney 9% (-5)

Barack Obama's Iowa bounce isn't just happening in New Hampshire — it's now in the national polling, too. The new Gallup poll shows that he and Hillary Clinton are tied nationwide, after Hillary had previously held big leads throughout 2007. Here are the numbers, compared to the last poll in mid-December:

Obama 33% (+6)
Clinton 33% (-12)
Edwards 20% (+5)

Here's some detail on the internal discussions going on inside the Hillary campaign as they brace for the real possibility of a loss to Obama in New Hampshire tomorrow.

According to a Hillary adviser I spoke to today, Camp Hillary insiders who have been with her a very long time, such as Patti Solis Doyle, are worried about the long term damage that could be done to Hillary if she decides to fight on after a New Hampshire loss, though there's no indication they are yet urging an exit.

"People who are close to Hillary personally are worried about what this is doing to her, what it might do to her career," the adviser says. "This is about protecting her future. That's the way it's being presented. You have a number who are saying to her, `Consider the Senate career.'

"They're worried about the way the media might characterize her -- a woman being on the attack, that kind of thing," the adviser continued. "There's a real debate going on within the campaign." (Solis Doyle didn't immediately respond to a request for comment left through a spokesperson.)

Meanwhile, another camp of insiders -- what the adviser characterized as the "political warriors" -- is urging her to fight on in the event of a defeat in New Hampshire. The people in this camp include pollster Mark Penn and top communications adviser Harold Wolfson, the adviser says.

"The political warriors are telling her to hunker down and stay in the fight," the adviser confided, adding that this faction believes that the new "talk versus action" message could work if given the time. "Give the message time to sink in,'" the adviser says this group is urging.

According to this adviser, the second group's argument seems to be taking hold for now. We'll see what happens.

Separately, there's been some talk today to the effect that James Carville has privately been urging her to stay in and fight it out through the later states. In an interview, Carville told me that this was indeed his position, but he also said that he had not been privately counseling Hillary to do this.

More as I learn it.

Obama goes on ABC News, beats back allegations from Hillary about the lobbyist/New Hampshire official in his campaign, revises his earlier claim that Hillary is "likable enough"...

Yet another poll shows that Barack Obama has jumped into the lead in New Hampshire — and the pollster can point to specific people who have changed their minds. The new CBS poll interviewed the exact same pool of respondents they had back in November, and here are the numbers they got:

Obama 35% (+16)
Clinton 28% (-11)
Edwards 19% (+10)

Back in November, 72% of respondents thought Hillary was the most electable, compared to 11% who said it was Obama. Now: 42% Obama, 41% Hillary. Also, 51% say Obama is prepared for the presidency, compared to only 37% last time.

The Wall Street Journal flags a key moment from the trail today, in which Hillary showed a table-full of undecided voters an emotional side:

“It’s not easy, it’s not easy,” Clinton said shaking her head. Her eyes began to get watery as she finished answering the question, “I couldn’t do it if I didn’t passionately believe it was the right thing to do. This is very personal for me. I have so many ideas for this country and I just don’t want to see us fall backwards. It’s about our country, it’s about our kids’ future,” she said softly crying, her voice breaking.

The group of 15 women sitting around a table at the Cafe Espresso nodded understandingly. Clinton continued, her voice still cracking: “We do it each one of us because we care about our country, but some of us are right and some of us are wrong, some of us are ready and some of us are not, some of us know what we’ll do on day one and some of us don’t,” she said.

Late Update: Ben Smith has a more extensive account.

Today's Suffolk University poll is the last survey out there to give Mitt Romney a lead in the New Hampshire Republican primary. Here are the numbers, compared to yesterday's poll:

Romney 30% (+0)
McCain 27% (+0)
Giuliani 10% (+0)
Huckabee 9% (+2)
Paul 8% (-1)

The Suffolk University poll in New Hampshire, which has been a pro-Hillary outlier all cycle, now gives Barack Obama a one-point lead. Here are the numbers, compared to yesterday's tracking poll:

Obama 35% (+2)
Clinton 34% (-1)
Edwards 15% (+1)

As of this result, there is no longer any poll out there that gives Hillary a lead in New Hampshire.

Hillary hits the morning shows, says of Obama, "where's the beef?"...

The new Fox News poll in New Hampshire is in line with other polls for the Republican side, giving John McCain a lead of seven points against Mitt Romney. To show just how far McCain has come, here are the numbers as compared to the last Fox poll of the state, from mid-December:

McCain 34% (+14)
Romney 27% (-6)
Huckabee 11% (+0)
Giuliani 9% (-7)

The new Fox News poll in New Hampshire puts Barack Obama ahead of Hillary Clinton, but by a smaller margin than most other polls out there. Here are the numbers, compared to their last New Hampshire poll from mid-December:

Obama 32% (+7)
Clinton 28% (-6)
Edwards 18% (+3)
Richardson 6% (+0)

Edwards senior adviser Joe Trippi has a theory about the Clinton campaign: He says that it's broke, or will be soon enough.

"There's a good chance that they're on the ropes financially," Trippi argued in an interview by cell phone from New Hampshire. "I can guarantee you their money is drying up. I don't think anyone is contributing to them."

Trippi was giving voice to a theory that's been moving around in political circles of late -- that the Hillary campaign's massive spending over the past couple months, combined with the fundraising slowdown that will inevitably attend Obama's victory over her in Iowa and possibly in New Hampshire, will ultimately leave the Hillary camp without the resources it needs to keep up its spending levels through the later primaries, as it needs to do.

The Hillary campaign had $35 million in cash on hand for the primary as of mid-October. There's no way of knowing for sure how much she's spent -- or raised -- since then until the next filing comes out.

Trippi -- who knows something about frontrunner campaigns petering out from his experiences with the Dean campaign in 2004 -- theorizes that Hillary's current level of spending will prove impossible to sustain for as long as she needs to sustain it, particularly since Obama's victory in Iowa and possible win in New Hampshire could unleash a flood of contributions for his campaign. It's unusual for senior campaign operatives to speculate about rival campaigns in such process-y detail.

"They're spending 20 million a month," Trippi said. "She had 400 organizers in Iowa, spent seven million on TV, had massive phone-banking and direct mail...I don't know how much longer they can go on [at this rate]."

Hillary spokesperson Howard Wolfson dismissed Trippi's speculation.

"I like Joe, but he should probably spend more time worrying about his own campaign," he told us. "Our resources are considerable and our organization is strong throughout the nation."

Anyway, take it for what it's worth. More from the Trippi interview a bit later.

This morning's Rasmussen poll shows Barack Obama's lead in New Hampshire is holding at ten points, with no significant changes since yesterday:

Obama 38% (-1)
Clinton 28% (+1)
Edwards 18% (+1)
Richardson 8% (+0)

Some more bad news for Hillary Clinton is that her favorables are significantly lower than those of the other candidates: "Eighty-six percent (86%) have a favorable opinion of Obama. Seventy-nine percent (79%) say the same about Edwards and 67% offer a positive assessment of Clinton."

Mitt Romney has his final two-minute TV ad up, appealing to New Hampshire's Republican voters to send him to Washington as the outsider who can actually get results. It's a clear contrast with John McCain, as Romney writes off any of the long-time Washington politicians as incapable of really accomplishing change.

The new Marist poll gives John McCain a four-point lead in New Hampshire. While that's technically dead heat, the number is consistent with multiple other polls — and for some perspective, just compare it to where the candidates were in Marist's December poll:

McCain 35% (+17)
Romney 31% (+0)
Huckabee 13% (+2)
Paul 6% (+2)
Giuliani 5% (-13)

Romney hasn't actually lost any support. Instead, the problem is that he's apparently topped out, having failed to gain any new voters while McCain has solidified the opposition.

The new Marist poll, conducted over the weekend, shows Barack Obama taking a good-sized lead in New Hampshire, after previously trailing by an even greater margin in December:

Obama 36% (+12)
Clinton 28% (-9)
Edwards 22% (+4)
Richardson 7% (-1)

Marist actually has Hillary ahead 36%-30% among core Democrats, but Obama mops the floors with her among independents: Obama 43%, Edwards 22%, Clinton 16%.

So with a few days of post-Iowa polling behind us, just how much of an effect have we seen in New Hampshire? A comparison between Zogby's pre-Iowa benchmarks and this morning's polls — which are composed of a pure post-Iowa sample over three days — gives the answer.

Obviously, Barack Obama has enjoyed a huge jump in the polls, but it turns out that Mitt Romney's Iowa defeat hasn't created any real benefit for John McCain:

Democrats:
Obama 39% (+13)
Clinton 29% (-3)
Edwards 19% (-1)
Richardson 6% (-1)

Republicans:
McCain 34% (+0)
Romney 29% (-1)
Huckabee 10% (+0)
Giuliani 9% (+0)
Paul 6% (-1)

John McCain may well win New Hampshire, but it wouldn't be because of any bounce in his favor — rather, it would be because of the absence of a bounce for Mitt Romney, who had been counting on one from an Iowa victory that never came.

This morning's Rasmussen poll shows John McCain holding a slim lead over Mitt Romney in New Hampshire, with no significant changes in that situation. Meanwhile, Ron Paul is in danger of coming in fifth place behind Rudy Giuliani, after previously beating Rudy by a good margin in Iowa.

Here are the numbers, as compared to yesterday's poll:

McCain 32% (+0)
Romney 31% (+1)
Huckabee 11% (+0)
Giuliani 10% (+1)
Paul 8% (-3)

Zogby's new tracking poll shows John McCain grabbing a five-point lead against Mitt Romney in New Hampshire, after having trailed by one point yesterday. This is Zogby's first tracking poll with a pure post-Iowa sample.

Here are the numbers, compared to yesterday's poll:

McCain 34% (+3)
Romney 29% (-3)
Huckabee 10% (-2)
Giuliani 9% (+2)
Paul 6% (+0)