Bill Day, Cagle Cartoons What’s interesting about New Hampshire is not Romney’s (fairly strong) win but the number of Democratic votes for Romney and the number of independent votes in general. Here’s how the Washington Post’s Dan Balz sees it: Romney’s campaign advisers are bracing for what they expect will be the nastiest contest yet. South Carolina has a history of negative politics,...

RJ Matson, The St. Louis Post Dispatch This copyrighted cartoon is licensed to run on TMV. Unauthorized reproduction prohibited.

Mitt Romney wouldn’t have caught Bin Laden. He would have bought Al Qaeda and fired him. ~ Commenters at DAILY KOS The clashes over class warfare that have bubbled to the surface as the Republican Party scrambles to anoint a challenger to President Obama is a healthy sign that addressing real issues is not completely dead, although the warfare happens to be for the wrong reasons. To find the right reasons,...

If former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney had lost New Hampshire or barely won it would have been a huge news story. In the end, he won and by a sizeable margin. But does this mean he’s a shoo in now for the nomination? Or can he be derailed? Is he a candidate who can be appealing to moderates, independents and centrists or has he now moved too far into the Talk Radio Political Culture territory and made...

If you’re interested, I’m live-blogging the results of the New Hampshire primary over at my place, looking at the results but also offering some broader commentary about the GOP race. Quick comments: It’s all about expectations, as you know, and about that much-overused word, “narrative.” And the problem for Romney tonight is that he has nothing to gain and much to lose. And if he underperforms,...

The New York Times, The Washington Post and most major cable news organizations are projecting that Mitt Romney will win the New Hampshire Republican presidential primary — several say by double digits over number 2, Ron Paul. The New York Times: Mitt Romney has won the New Hampshire Republican primary, projections show, achieving a sweep of the first two critical contests in the 2012 presidential race...

Despite the daily pounding he is getting from other candidates, by some conservative talk show hosts and his many gaffes, in the end former Massachusetts Gov Mitt Romney has emerged as the only candidate acceptable to GOP conservatives, moderates and liberals, a new Gallup Poll finds: Mitt Romney is now the only candidate that a majority of conservative and moderate/liberal Republicans nationwide see as an...

Tomorrow residents of the Granite State will be feeling like Roxie Hart after the verdict in her “Chicago” trial, abandoned and forgotten by hordes of reporters and camera crews who have besieged them over weeks for every detail of their decision-making, leanings and doubts about the candidates. All that ends tonight when votes are counted, and as the crafty lawyer explains in the movie, the “journalists”...

To see what the New Hampshire Primary looks like from New Hampshire, visit the website of the Union-Leader.

As Republicans loudly proclaim marriage as between one man and one woman, Democrats are quietly debating White House partnerships—-not only in a new insider book on the First Lady’s role but renewed discussion of Hillary Clinton joining the President on this year’s ticket. In the book, a New York Times reporter describes Michelle Obama “as a woman who, despite her public face as ‘mom-in-chief’…has...

The size and scope of the American Embassy in Baghdad has been something of a major news story in the U.S. – but not so much in Iraq. Until now that is. For Iraq’s Al-Iraq News, Ibrahim Zaidan reports that with the U.S. supposedly ‘withdrawing’, Iraqi lawmakers and religious figures are demanding to know why Washington needs a $6.2 billion embassy staffed by 16,000 people that is bigger...

Nate Beeler, The Washington Examiner This copyrighted cartoon is licensed to run on TMV. Unauthorized reproduction prohibited.

Some good news for Mitt Romney: a new CBS News poll finds that the former Massachusetts Governor is the only GOPer in the race could beat President Barack Obama.

But is it? Are most voters still tolerant of the greed machine? Even the Wall Street Journal is probing the history of Bain Capital. While it persists in claiming Romney was an “excellent CEO” of Bain, it showcases the failures… … A researcher at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, said the rate at which Bain’s target companies ran into trouble at some stage “seems...

You’d think someone in politics as long as Mitt Romney (OOPS! He is just a businessman who has dabbled in politics off and on) would know better. But he doesn’t. He made a remark about enjoying firing an insurance company — but it’s the enjoying firing part of it that’s now be jumped on by his opponents. They seem (NOT!) to be forgetting other parts of the statement. This is somewhat...

For years Democrats have complained that in national and even more local elections Republicans would “Swift Boat” Democrats. And even in the most aggressive Republican contests, many GOPers would at least pay lip service to Ronald Reagan’s 11th commandment about making nice to other Republicans. No more (and why should that be surprising when many conservatives today reject some of the things...

RJ Matson, The St. Louis Post Dispatch This copyrighted cartoon is licensed to run on TMV. Unauthorized reproduction prohibited.

It is all over! In a much-awaited development, Sarah Palin’s husband, Todd Palin, has just announced to a with-bated-breath-waiting world that he is endorsing Newt Gingrich for president. According to ABC News, “Todd Palin said he believes that being in the political trenches and experiencing the highs and lows help prepare a candidate for the future and the job of president.” King maker Palin...

Just in time, our frayed nerves go back to the quiet and calm of “Downton Abbey” in World War I after a weekend of Republicans crying havoc over Barack Obama, pausing only in sniping at one another for restful outbursts of road rage, blaming the President for everything wrong in the 21st century world. Robotic Mitt Romney, as befits a frontrunner, leads the pack in letting “slip the dogs of war,” stabbing...

Another Obama Chief-of-Staff bites the dust….. From a New York Times Breaking News Alert: William M. Daley, Obama’s Chief of Staff, Stepping Down, White House Officials Say William M. Daley, President Obama’s chief of staff, is stepping down, White House officials confirmed Monday. The news was first reported by The Los Angeles Times. Mr. Daley, a former commerce secretary and the son and brother of...

A new Gallup Poll has bad news for both political parties and (relatively) good news for Democrats and bad news for Republicans: The percentage of Americans identifying as political independents increased in 2011, as is common in a non-election year, although the 40% who did so is the highest Gallup has measured, by one percentage point. More Americans continue to identify as Democrats than as Republicans, 31%...

ROMNEY CAMPAIGNS IN SOUTH CAROLINA Coming off of his razor-thin victory in the Iowa caucuses, tomorrow’s New Hampshire primary is Mitt Romney’s for the taking, but it is South Carolina’s January 21 primary that will determine whether a man who a year ago appeared to be the inevitable Republican nominee can finally leave the competition in the dust. This is because if Romney wins South Carolina,...

Tea Partiers claim to support smaller government but are most enthusiastic about Rick Santorum, who hearts earmarks and right-wing nanny state paternalism, and Newt Gingrich, who would use big government to finance colonies on the moon. How to explain this contradiction? First of all, I suspect that many Tea Partiers really don’t know what they stand for other than identity politics. Secondly, I suspect...

WINDHAM, N.H. — It isn’t every day that political candidates are asked whether the 10th Amendment allows states to nullify federal laws, but that was precisely the question Rick Santorum faced at a forum here a few days ago organized by a libertarian-leaning group. To his credit, Santorum did not pander to the nullifier. “We had a Civil War about nullification,” Santorum said with...

For 4 decades America could count on Egypt as a reliable ally in managing Middle East affairs. For 4 decades American military aid guaranteed Egyptian government would stick by its western allies. Well that chapter in history is over and a new chapter begins. As Islamic movements grab power across the Middle East, the US can no longer count on Egypt as a reliable ally. When Mubarak`s regime began to sway in...