rick santorum. >> reporter: santorum isn't running from those comments. he boasts he's a full spectrum conservative in his new ad. he also has the support of christian conservative reality tv star jim bob duggar who's driving the bus across iowa. he backed huckabee in '08. he's urging evangelical voters to back santorum now. >> a proven track record, a christian conservative that has always stood for what's right. >> the chuck truck! >> reporter: santorum doesn't ride in the bus. does he his campaigning in a pickup truck. a better fit for santorum's down to earth pitch. jim acosta, cnn, boone, iowa. >>> let's dig deeper into santorum's surge. joining me is dana lash, st. louis tea party organizer and editor and chief, ari fleischer and ball begala who joins me in des moines. the santorum surge, how surprising is it to? what do you make of? >> it's stunning. seven front-runners in iowa. three aren't in the race anymore. santorum seems like the guy who never did lead. i see him as franc finkle? he's the only guy that survived the battle of little big horn.

we begin with rick santorum. momentum is with the pennsylvania senator and he is sticking to his conservative guns. candidate santorum this afternoon. >> i would suggest if you look at the history of republican nominees, that moderate voters, moderate candidates who were there to appeal to more moderates ended up losing. >> but is that tough enough? listen to what congressman ron paul had to say about santorum earlier to cnn's dana bash. >> why would not he be a good republican nominee? >> he is very liberal. >> santorum is liberal? >> have you looked at his record? >> uh-huh. >> go look at his record. >> cnn political correspondent jim acosta is in boone, iowa. he spent the day with jim santorum. i understand he got some interesting last-minute help. >> reporter: that's right. don't tell jim bob dug per rick santorum is too liberal. the reality show tv show star, he is the star of the reality tv show 19 kids and counting. he backed mike huckabee. he's been in support of the former pennsylvania senator. you won't

>> mitt romney. >> i voted for mitt romney. >> tonight my choice is rick santorum. >> rick santorum. >> the biggest thing he is lektability. that is between santorum and mitt romney. i chose romney at the very end. >> what do you like about romney? >> i like the lektability. >> governor romney can raise $3 billion. i think he can match obama dollar for dollar. i believe he can definitely defeat mr. obama. >> what is it about mitt romney that attracted you? >> i think like his family values. i just feel like maybe he could be the one to beat obama. he might be the best at get along in washington. >> and he's the guy who can win? that seems to be the overarching argument tonight, right? >> right. >> if santorum come out and be the nominee, do you think he can beat president obama? >> i think. so. >> and santorum won in precinct two. >> i could live with rick santorum. >> do you believe he can defeat president obama? >> i hope he can. yes. yeah, i do. he is one of america's choices and his ideals and his beliefs. >> and is rick santorum a candidate you're happy with, somebody you can li

who is rick santorum? is he the guy conservatives can rally around to defeat mitt romney, who again last night was rejected by three quarters of iowa republicans or a one-hit wonder, you see this year's mike huckabee? romney has money, the organization and the patience to outrun santorum, but does his side have the passion? also, the right-wing empire is about to strike back. michele bachmann dropped out today. her voters are a lot more likely to stick a santorum sign on their yards than a romney one. jon huntsman is all about knocking off romney personally, and for newt gingrich, it's not business, it's strictly personal. get ready, mitt. the right's coming at you. plus, will the republicans sign an abm treaty, anybody but mitt? can a coalition of santorum, gingrich and perry voters be formed to stop romney? and is team obama happy right now? not as happy as you would think. they love that romney didn't win big out there in iowa, but worry that santorum will be just the latest anti-romney whose bubble is

lead to a 4 santorum lead. iowa is very -- they do politic there is in a very polite fashion. if they came to a disagreement like this tonight, where they can't find the guy with the official piece of paper, they apparently have rounded up the representatives of the camps who have agreed, yes, we were there, we know exactly what the total was and we both agree to what it was. >> so there you have it, bret and we should point out hathis source inside the republican national committee is the one who told karl early they're the two presimpghts were keokuk and clinton. that's exactly right -- >> confirmed that. we identified that -- >> excuse me. but they also told but the fact that story had been undercounted and that was also correct. and they are now saying that all sides of agreed that when the final precinct is counted that mitt romney is going to win the iowa caucus by 14 votes. back to you. >> wow. that is big news because officially, rick santorum is up by 4. so we will wait to hear that officially at the c

they look to santorum. not saying he didn't deserve the victory, he worked for it but he was lucky with his timing. >> he had a loser label because he was an ex-senator that had disastrous last campaign. all of the others got a shot around they all were not of presidential stature. when they at last had a look at santorum, he was a guy with experience, and articulate, he knows the issues. unlike a couple of the other pretenders. he's a serious guy with a track record. i think that in the end, the system worked. yes, haphazardly but that is how america works. churchill once said america always ends up doing the right thing after it's tried everything else. well, that's how iowa worked. >> so then does south carolina become this real conservative battle with perry in the game and santorum? it looks like newt gingrich, that is his firewall. >> yeah, yet another southern politician. i think new hampshire is going to be discounted to a certain extent because it's romney's second home state. i think there is a hi

rick santorum hopes to be the guy to stop him, but santorum is learning that that old e.f. hutton motto holds for presidential candidates, too. when front-runners talk, people listen. and santorum is having a sticky time scoring points after his first-place tie in iowa. newt takes on mitt. in just a few weeks, newt gingrich has gone from undisputed front-runner to also ran. and he has mitt romney and his stealth ad campaign to thank for that. i sat down with newt last night after the program and he did not hold back. >> he ought to take those ads home and show them to his grandsons and said, grandpa did this, what do you think about this kind of trash on television? >> newt vows to be the last man in the fight with mitt. >>> plus, politico called it mitt's weekend from hell. the big debate weekend coming up with everyone looking down -- looking to take down romney. "meet the press" anchor and debate host david gregory looks ahead to what could be a make-or-break battle this sunday. >>> and speaking of republican debates, there was one today, a phony funny or die debate on y

for santorum? gwen: no signs of that yet but i wonder if there are any signs of santorum taking a bead on romney? he really hasn't been that critical of him so far. >> no, indirectly critical. in fact in one of the events in wyndham earlier this week, santorum, he made reference to romney's support for the wall street bailout saying a certain massachusetts governor, you can go look up who that was. but they may also be waiting for romney to inflict the damage unto himself. remember, this was the debate four years ago that was the you're likable enough moment. if they can get under romney's skin enough for him to get angry or to come off more on the attack, then that could also be beneficial to a santorum or a paul. >> the problem for santorum, of course, is the romney campaign and super pac supporting him have shown if they take somebody seriously, they will go after him. they did it with rick perry when he first got in the race. they did it obviously with newt gingrich. i think if you get to a mom

rick santorum is 4%. mitt romney is over 40 -- >> he'll be well into the high double digits by the morning. but the question is: how much he gets there? and as i said, he will be challenged -- he doesn't have the resources. but he is a new face. three weeks ago, two -- three weeks ago, newt gingrich was at 38%. as i have said to you before, we have this huge group of very -- people looking for something and they keep landing somewhere. they just landed -- rick santorum's lucky, they landed on him last. but he will have a tough problem. this is a man who lost a senate race by more than almost any incumbent in history in a re-election. it's going to have a hard argument on the winning. he's very sincere. but the social issue problem, we'll see how it works. i don't think in a general election, he has a prayer. the question is whether voters will see that -- >> but he has pointed out several times. i asked him about this earlier this week on my afternoon show. he has pointed out that even though he is defini

very strongly for santorum. to a lesser degrees, ron paul, but significant, but put a circle around 14%, only 14% of those born again christians, evangelicals voting for mitt romney, underscores his problem with social conservatives. the upside for mitt romney tonight, what is the most important issue for caucusgoers? who could beat president obama and there, elect ability being the issue that is where romney performs very, very well. what is second most important is who is the true conservative? there, again, advantage santorum. advantage, ron paul. and we keep talking about ron paul. isn't he really the wildcard here? mike huckabee, who won four years ago, said he can't be the republican nominee. so all the twist and turns in this race, chris, we could have another one if ron paul could end up winning this thing tonight. >> yeah i guess the question comes down in each party, what point in the nominating process do you go from picking the candidate of your heart or your gut to the picking of the candidate who y

rick santorum. >> yes. >> this of course brings in a different element to the whole deal. >> what if they all decide newt gingrich is their guy, that newt gingrich now roused from his i'm going to only be the positive guy is now going to go after not only barack obama but also mitt romney and that newt gingrich can be the guy who can win why couldn't he be the guy who coalesced them? >> personally i don't think newt can win the south as well as santorum could because of the conservative base and his track record. i mean, these ads we were talking about earlier, i mean sooner or later newt is going to do a newt. a lot of that stuff that was in the super pac ads, it's baggage stuff. but moving forward for santorum, this is great news for him tonight. now will the capitulation of a couple other conservatives help? would the old conservatives who hold a lot of money embrace rick santorum? they can't stand romney. he told me not mitt now or ever. >> there will be a constituency of people out there that r

lead to a 4 santorum lead. iowa is very -- they do politic there is in a very polite fashion. if they came to a disagreement like this tonight, where they can't find the guy with the official piece of paper, they apparently have rounded up the representatives of the camps who have agreed, yes, we were there, we know exactly what the total was and we both agree to what it was. >> so there you have it, bret and we should point out hathis source inside the republican national committee is the one who told karl early they're the two presimpghts were keokuk and clinton. that's exactly right -- >> confirmed that. we identified that -- >> excuse me. but they also told but the fact that story had been undercounted and that was also correct. and they are now saying that all sides of agreed that when the final precinct is counted that mitt romney is going to win the iowa caucus by 14 votes. back to you. >> wow. that is big news because officially, rick santorum is up by 4. so we will wait to hear that officially at the c

santorum. ezra klein. i'm ed schultz. that's "the ed show." listen to my radio show on sirius xm 127. follow me on twitter @edshow and @wegoted. you did a great job last night quarterbacking this whole thing. >> sitting next to you and thinking ahead this was going to the first night of the caucus fights the rest of the year, i had a great time. this is fun. >> we have a lot more entertainment on the way. >>> thanks for you at home for sticking with us the next hour. remember the john ensign sex scandal? every once in a while in the news business it pays to be a total darork and unabashedly obsessed with the story nobody else is talking about at the time. for example, the john ensign sex scandal. i confess, i found the john ensign sex scandal obsessively fascinating for a really long time even though it basically never made front page national news, at least until he resigned. sometimes, though, this i think is true in life as much as it is in the news. sometimes months and years later after yo

rick santorum. >> reporter: santorum isn't running from those comments. in fact he boasts he's a full spectrum conservative in his new ad. he has tv star jim bob duggar who is driving this santorum bus across iowa. he backed huckabee in '08. he's urging evangelical voterers to get behind santorum now. >> he has a proven track record, a conservative that's always stood for what's right. >> reporter: t-- >> the chuck truck. >> reporter: santorum doesn't ride in the bus. he rides in pickup truck. better for his pitch. jim acosta, boon, iowa. >>> joining me is dana lash, st. louis tea party organizer, political contributor ari fleischer and democratic strategist paul begala who joins me here in des moines. the santorum surge, how surprising is it to you? >> it's stunning. seven front-runners in iowa. three are not even in the race any more. santorum seemed like the only guy who never did lead. i see him as the frank finkel of the race. >> who is frank finkel? >> the only guy who survived the battle of little big horn. he survived -- on the white guys side. he

they caught the santorum surge. but the point you were making in your conversation with gwen is the salient, judy and that is rick perry and newt gingrich together, together probably scraped together to get maybe as many votes as ron paul and fewer votes than rick santorum. so they have to be staring into their hold card tonight. it's a long long time from the 3rd of january to the 21st in south carolina and the world's going to turn many times. the toughest decircumstance is newt gingrich. me has new gingrich newb?does hd say no more mr. nice guy. calling mitt romney a liar and just go scorch to earth for the next week. if so that could certainly change the dynamic of this race. >> david what do these numbers say to you and particularly i'm interested in what happened to mitt romney. he got this% of th in 24% of thd mike hum be who had 37 percent pemplets hiand yet he's runningn one would assume to iowa republicans. >> demography is destiny. what wewwn%ó saw four years agon the clinton/obama race, there were more

and santorum in fourth. the question is this momentum that santorum has, does it pass newt gingrich, it will be damaging to the gingrich candidacy if it does. does it get to and pass ron paul? if it does, then santorum is going to have a really good night next tuesday. even if it doesn't reach his goal of keeping mitt romney under 30. >> sean: what about this power grab of barack obama's as it relates to recess appointments? interesting, you were there in the bush white house. something that george bush, in other words, if the senate is in session, constitution is very clear on this, that you cannot have recess appointments. the democrats use that a number of times so that president bush could not recess appoint people. >> right. >> sean: as a matter of fact, then senator obama said it was the wrong thing to do. in other words doing it even the right way. he now went ahead with the power grab. i dent think a lot of people in the immediate -- i don't think a lot of people in the media are looking closely at i

. >> rick santorum's political career will be ending soon. he will go to the republican convention next year not as a candidate but as a fox news contributor again. >> santorum has traveled all of iowa, and he's still gaining no traction. there's a reason for that. >> then of course, santorum finished in a virtual tie in the iowa caucuses. how could news outlets make this mistake again and fail to scrutinize santorum's record in the process? mitt romney faces skeptical questioning despite winning iowa because his margin was a measly eight votes. >> what does did say about your candidacy that you actually won fewer votes than but in 2008, and you fought rick santorum to a draw? >> perhaps the press is just trying to keep this race alive? >>> plus, we'll talk to the political director of the dominant tv station, wmur, about covering the nation's first primary as a local story. >>> i'm howard kurtz and this is the new hampshire edition of "reliable sources." >>> the media narrative here in new hampshire is set. mitt romney wins easily, everyone

rick santorum is at 11. romney leads nationally at 29 followed by rick santorum with 21. so, joe klein, it looks like rick santorum is slowly edging up to be the number one challenger to romney. >> the south carolina number is interesting. i don't want to break any news here, but this new hampshire primary isn't all that interesting this time. you know, the next really big deal is south carolina. except for the two debates here this weekend, i might add. >> doesn't what happens this weekend set up what happens on tuesday? that sets up what happens in south carolina. it's dynamic. >> but in the past, you could see the dynamic asserting itself in the week between iowa and new hampshire. i don't see all that much happening out here and you can see that in the polls. >> it seems like such a short chasm between the two. i remember that ronald reagan had, what, 36 days to make up for what he lost in '80? >> this is one week. there are a couple reasons. one is, as joe says, the debates. everything's kind of stalled, waiting for the weekend -- >> this saturday night -- >> from th

rick santorum. rick santorum. rick santorum. rick santorum. rick santorum. ron paul. rick santorum. michele bachmann. newt gingrich. rick perry. mitt romney. rick santorum. rick santorum. newt gingrich. mitt romney. mitt romney. rick santorum. rick santorum in one spot. mitt romney second, paul and newt gingrich tied in third. it appears that the first count. rick santorum, first, mitt romney, second, paul and newt gingrich tied for third. i will announce the total study audience and a make the official tabulation to des moines. just again so that we have the ascent of mr. freeman, the sheriff, the observers, our president secretary -- >> [inaudible] >> sure, that would be fine. rick santorum, 41, mitt romney, 32, ron paul and newt gingrich at 13, bachmann, seven, perry, six, huntsman, one. rick santorum winds, mitt romney, second, paul and newt gingrich third. i will have use i met with the secretary and announce the results to the caucus and we will make the call to des moines. we will go ahead and announce these. [inaudible] >> may be that we could do it this time, sheriff, why d

point. >> santorum -- look, i talked to santorum -- i talked to santorum's people yesterday and they're really, really excited about new hampshire. they say that they have the second most endorsements -- >> they've never been there before. >> forget new hampshire. that's not the game anymore. >> let me finish. they say they have the second most endorsements of any contender, second to romney in new hampshire. 82 county captains spread through all new hampshire counties. i don't believe he has a ground game in new hampshire. >> i don't either. >> he doesn't have a chance in new hampshire. but they're excited. >> john heilemann, unfortunately, we have to say good-bye to you. i know you were shaking your head. i'll let have you the last two seconds of the segment. thank you for joining us. take it away. >> rick santorum will not be the republican nominee. have a wonderful caucus day, you guys. it will be a lovely night. >> that's right. >> thank you. >>> when we come back, santorum's time in the spotlight. can he handle it? an accident doesn't have to slow you down. with better car replace

we saw with rick santorum. what killed rick santorum the fact he got nailed from the right by michele bachmann right away. i think that was the first thing that really hurt the perry then, of course, the debate debacles but on the hpv vaccine and attacked right away. if you're working for romney right now you're pulling research that will go to santorum from the right. how vulnerable do you think he is and do you think that's the first thing we'll see the attack on him be in the next week? >> if you compare santorum to the earlier not romney candidates, on paper he has less positive, not been a successful governor like huntsman or perry. he can speak knowledgeably and fluently about the issues in a way that bachmann and cain and perry repeatedly failed to do. the chief obstacle people didn't think others would vote for him. once he started taking off in the polls they had permission to start voting for him. that dynamic is not over so i think it's going to be actually quite difficult for romney to attack santor

santorum third. not a lot of votes, if the margin stays the same as that adds up, that alone is enough for romney to make it up when you're talking about 37 votes. let's boom it back out. dubuque, 92% of the vote, precincts, not vote, precincts. let me make that clear. 8% of the precincts. mitt romney ahead, rick santorum third. if the margins keep up, that's a place mitt romney can, doesn't mean he will, can make up the votes. more of the votes still out over here. 97% of the vote in linn county. romney winning convincingly in this county right now, by tonight's standards in iowa. if you're the santorum cam pawn where an we make up votes? 100% counted. 100% counted. the western part of the state, 100% counted. you keep coming out there. if you're looking for areas where the vote is still out, they are areas where right now mitt romney is leading. they're not all big areas. there are enough votes still out there, wolf, for mitt romney to catch up and eke this out. this is the second time around for m

santorum 28% of the vote. in 2008, romney received 34% of vote in plymouth county and huckabee got 25%. santorum out per forming huckabee back then and romney under performing romney in 2008. as you look county by county, what are you seeing about the romney performance tonight compared to where he was in 2008. >> brit: let's bear in mind about the romney performance. except for the past week he did have good organizational efforts he didn't campaign that hard. none of us would have been surprised up to am in about week or temp days if romney was lower 18, 20%. so i think romney coming through this everything to have the breakout performance that creates the momentum where everybody says okay, it's going to be romney and everybody flocks towards him. he didn't get that tonight. i think he coming through where he was. in reasonably good shape. santorum i think is your story. >> brett: brit, as always, thank you very much. seven counties remain and nobody is over 33%. the one county that is really big is sioux c

i picked santorum, didn't i? liberals, why are you chewing me out when it comes to stumping for santorum? you know who the big winner was last night? president obama. today he was in ohio making moves that congressional republicans have been blocking for months. this is "the ed show." let's get to work. >> you think we can get more than an eight-vote margin here in new hampshire, i'm going to try. >> romney squeaked by santorum. the big winner in iowa last night was the president. today the president is kicking off his campaign with a big speech and some bold moves. >> today i'm appointing richard as america's consumer watchdog. >> msnbc's richard wolffe and katrina vanden heuvel of "the nation" magazine on the fallout from iowa and how it helps the president. >>> if you take, you know, santorum and perry and bachmann and gingrich, you get some sense of what a small minority romney really represents. >> the republican plan to stop mitt romney is beginning to unfold. and it's gaining momentum. bill burton of prior

could it be a rick santorum? >> well, i mean, it's going to be whoever wins the republican nomination and you know, to sell rick santorum short now would be committing the same error twice. here are a couple of things. first is, it looks like two candidates are about to get out. rick perry and michele bachmann. if you take their 15 points and put them on either rick santorum or newt gingrich, they become the front-runner in this thing again. i don't know if those 15 points go to one place, but that's the play here for both newt gingrich and rick santorum. they both want to become the single, lone alternative to mitt romney. that's how mitt romney gets defeated. and it's probably the only way he gets defeated. the field needs to get winnowed, the fracturing needs to stop, conservatives need to unite behind one candidate or mitt romney will be the nominee. 3 out of 4 voters in iowa last night went in to vote for somebody other than mitt romney in every single alternative was flawed in some way. so the conservatives

i think is had biggest problem is rick santorum and the momentum that santorum has with him. he sort of sucks up not only votes that could have gone to rick perry among evangelical christians, but also, potentially, if rick perry were getting a bang for every one of his dollars you would see him higher in the polls now. the problem he's facing you don't see that yet and it's hard to imagine undecides, given with rick santorum and given the way that they've talked about an issues, suddenly flocking to rick perry. >> bret: if rick santorum had rick perry's money or perry had santorum's momentum. >>-- >> on the bus tour and spending time with people, rick santorum has been camped out in iowa and accounts for support he has and perry has been running an ad dawr where you need to be on the ground more and running a relationship. >> perry has, baggage is probably not the right word, but he's made mistakes and people have concerns about his debating style, can he debate barack obama in a one-on-one. and they don't have those with rick santorum. nothing is stopping rick santorum for

question, santorum is roman catholic. given two-thirds of iowa voters are christian, why didn't santorum easily defeat romney? i ask you, james. >> hi wasn't the only christian in the race. most are evangelicals. you had rick perry who had transformed himself into being the texas job creator, into being a social conservative. michele bachmann went for the social conservative vote. even newt gingrich talked about his conversion to catholicism so it's split among the candidates. >> here's santorum on the issues. >> climate change. "a beautifully concocted scheme. just an excuse for more government control of your life." gay marriage. wants a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage, saying "it destroys the basic unit of our society because it condones waiver that is antithetical to strong, healthy families." stem cell research. opposees such research, thus breaking with then-president gw bush. partial-birth abortion, led the charge in congress against partial-birth abortion. question, will santorum win new hampshi

santorum said. listen to this clip. >> with respect to the issue about -- i get a kick out of this with governor romney. newt said this at the debate. governor romney is not like he's tried to be a career politician. he's just not been successful. >> still pretty polite the exchanges between romney and santorum. >> so far. the heat hasn't turned up yet. if he comes out of iowa, and, you know, given the sampling of evangelicals, he can do even better. if he bounces into new hampshire, it's going to be on romney has to do well in new hampshire. they haven't managed expectations well. the polling has shown he doesn't need to manage expectations. if that changes, there's going to be a lot to come after. there hasn't been a lot of time to do the opposition research on santorum. people haven't thought about him. >> we haven't seen rick santorum in the hot seat at a debate yet. there hasn't been one. we haven't really seen ron paul as front-runner in the hot seat at a debate. we'll be able to do that in ne

you interrupted rick santorum big time. mr. santorum spoke for 60% -- 60% of the nearly eight minute interview. it's my job to ask as many questions as possible and keep the conversation pithy. no campaign speeches are allowed on "the factor." doris, one in idaho. why do you bully all the conservatives and lavish praise on all your liberal friends? doris, that's just lunacy, as dick morris said last night, kool-aid drinking goes both ways. the point here is that we have been remarkably consistent for more than 15 years about asking tough questions. but we have also sharpened our focus recently. all americans seeking power will be scrutinized on the program, which is why some of them are too frightened to come on. we don't care much about party politics here. we care a lot about looking out for you. one more letter about santorum and we'll have more mail later on. this one from deborah in virginia. you were a little soft on mr. santorum. you let him off on questions about birth control and gay marriage. it was obvious he did not

rick santorum, 24,134. ron paul coming in third with 79% of the precincts reporting, 21%, he's got 21,000 votes. newt gingrich is a distant fourth, only 13%, only 13,000 votes. rick perry, about 10%, 10,000 votes. michele bachmann, 5%, about 5,000 votes. jon huntsman at 1% of the votes. let's go to erick and gloria. what's going on over here? you're looking closely at these numbers. santorum was ahead, now slightly, slightly, mitt romney ahead. >> we've been looking as it's flip-flopped around, and each of the leaders and why. now let's look at mitt romney and where his strength is coming from. two things we want to hone in on. we asked people, what's the most important candidate quality, can defeat obama. 31% of the caucusgoers told us that was the most important thing. true conservative, 25%. i'm going to tell you right now, those voters went overwhelmingly for ron paul. strong moral character, a quarter of voters said that was most important. and i'll tell you right now, that went overwhelmingly for rick

among republicans santorum is winning. santorum 27, romney 25. here's the other big demographic difference. four years ago, those 17 to 29 were 11% of the electorate. this year they're 15%. guess who they're working for? ron paul, santorum. this is interesting about ron paul's base, among those moderate or liberal they're voting for ron paul. he's the winner there. among conservatives they're voting for rick santorum buncht among evangelicals according to the entrance poll ron paul was winning among evangelicals. >> but they're also split. a lot of the independents are the moderate and liberal coming into the republican party. >> dana loesch from big journalism.com. what do you see? >> i've been looking at the top three and looking at some of the numbers coming in for ron paul. i'm genuinely shocked just as the sheer number of independents. also that 43% number that's defining themselves as moderate or liberal. you can look at this as this is a candidate who can reach out to independents and reach out to those moderates who will be helping the go

rick santorum doesn't. can he perform well in new hampshire, come up a little bit, then go to south carolina, go to florida? he's going to have to make a lot of decisions very quickly if he comes out on top of this tonight but he's going to have to scale up very quickly and have the challenge. he is going to have to be drinking water out of a fire hydra hydrant. >> are there enough people that can help him scale up? everybody is sort of committed aren't they? >> i think he's done it with a skeleton staff, a lot of his kids are working on the campaign. they don't have a lot of people who have done this professionally. so i think that he is going to have a lot of challenges over the days ahead. but he may well emerge after tonight as the chief alternative to governor romney. if you look back four years ago, in south carolina, the single most important thing that happened to john mccain in terms of winning the nomination was the fact that fred thompson didn't get out of the race after a disappointing finnish i