The Daily Five: All Together Now

1. All the candidates, both parties, on-stage together. Watch for this momentus photo op in the intermission of tonight's ABC News presidential debate double-header.

2. The State, South Carolina's largest newspaper, urges Fred Thompson to drop out and endorse John McCain. Patience, folks...patience...

3. 3000 Democrats showed up to see Barack Obama in Nashua this morning. I know this merits more treatment than a sentence, but, well, I was at a Clinton event 40 miles away. I'll cover Obama tomorrow. BTW: at said event, Bill O'Reilly nearly got into a fight with Obama's entourage. Watch Fox News, which is obsessing over the story, for the gory details.

4. The Real Mitt Romney (TM) sounds a lot more like John McCain and Mike Huckabee then you would think. And I've got to say: Romney just gets into his wheelhouse when he talks about governance and pragmatism and solving big problems.

5. The Culinary Workers Union in Las Vegas plans to endorse next Wednesday. Perhaps the decisive endorsement of the Nevada caucuses. Scratch the perhaps. THE endorsement to get. It's interesting that they're waiting until after New Hampshire...

Comments

Marc, thanks for your NH reports.

Is Bill Clinton trying to get Independents to vote for McCain (so Obama does not win)?

Also, in case you have not heard, the HillRaiser, Norman Hsu, is back in news:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/05/us/05hsu.html

Posted by eorse | January 5, 2008 5:12 PM

It was astonishingly stupid for Romney and his advisors to decide that the partisan evangelical whackos of Iowa were so important that in an election ALL about change and the ability of a candidate and their experience in creating successful change - the best change agent (Romney) was diverted into a "more Christian than thou, purer on abortion hating than thou debate".

It may have been important to demonstrate Romney's deep moral values, but the whole pack of Republians locked into a religious values debate and who was most like Reagan 25 years ago and would bring that back - while Dems talked new programs hurt the whole pack of Reps, not just Romney.

The Romney camp was stupid to go along with it. It made Romney look phoney, and his loss was all but guaranteed when a slick-talking Evangelical Pastor took his glowing cross ads and "real Christian Leader shtick to the Iowan evangelical activists.

Ambinder - The Real Mitt Romney (TM) sounds a lot more like John McCain and Mike Huckabee then you would think. And I've got to say: Romney just gets into his wheelhouse when he talks about governance and pragmatism and solving big problems.

Yeah, it was smart to change course after Iowa and getting back to "the guy who has fixed messes all his life". Time will tell if it is too late after squandering all those months arguing who loves Sweet Baby Jesus more.

Also, I noticed that the Republican with the most thought out, specific stance on issues and fixes needed is Fred Thompson. If only he had more drive and energy! Fred is clearly a very good thinker, as his great extemp remarks on Bhutto showed him immensely more informed and strategic-thinking than Hillary, Huckabee, Obama, even outdid Biden in the quality of his foreign policy remarks about Pakistan.

Posted by Chris Ford | January 5, 2008 6:14 PM

This debate should decide who gets the nomination on both sides. Or is that reading way too much into this?

Debate liveblog.
http://www.political-buzz.com/

Posted by matt | January 5, 2008 7:05 PM