Today's primary

TPM:

Still not looking good for Mitt tomorrow. But the final swing of the pendulum, picked up by various observers like Marc Ambinder and winger reporters like Bob Novak and others is that Romney's regrouped in the final 48 hours and could pull off a surprise by nudging ahead of McCain.

My gut tells me that McCain probably pulls through. But perhaps not.

But let's plot out this map a little further. Let's say McCain takes first tomorrow with Romney a very close second. It's close to fatal for Romney but not quite. What's more, and what you need to look at to game out the significance is what comes next. The next big fight is in South Carolina. And two new polls out today (Rasmussen and SurveyUSA) show Huckabee in a dominant position in the state. So Huckabee looks likely to take Secessionville with either McCain or Romney coming in second.

At that point you'll have to say that Huckabee, who the GOP establishment is roundly against, is the frontrunner in the campaign. And the others are going to coalesce around an anti-Huckabee candidate. It's not clear to me that McCain is a shoe-in for that role.

More from TPM:

My wife and I are NH residents and registered independents (or undeclared as the state calls it) and went to vote at 7am in Nashua. There was no line per-say, but there was a lot of activity. People going in and out...exit pollster (complete with media logos) handing out clipboards with surveys...Obama and Hillary supporters with signs at the school parking lot entrance. There were lots of Edwards signs out on the street. The only evidence of republicans was a single Ron Paul sign across the street.

When I want to pick up my ballot, I saw a lot of names in the book with "UND" crossed out and "DEM" written in its place. Anecdotally, this indicated a lot of independents breaking for the dems, probably for Obama. McCain just held a big rally here yesterday, but there was no evidence of it now.

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AMERICAblog - The Republican train wreck

One of the most fun -- and perhaps the most gratifying -- things about the 2008 elections is the mess that's evolving on the GOP side. They have very flawed candidates -- flawed by the standards of their fellow Republicans. And, the negativity on their side is intense.

Let's do a quick review. Watching the ABC debate one thing was abundantly clear: The other candidates loathe Mitt Romney. For the past couple weeks, it's been obvious that the GOP "establishment" (the Weekly Standard, National Review types and their moneyed friends) hate and fear Mike Huckabee. John McCain is too much of a maverick and unpredictable. Thompson's campaign was a dud. And, Rudy "9/11" Giuliani seems like he's dropped off the face of the earth. The only candidate with any intensity is Ron Paul and he's got no shot.

What do the Republicans do? New Hampshire will provide some direction. If Romney wins, he may be on a roll. If McCain wins, he may become the default candidate. However this plays out, GOPers aren't going to be happy with their nominee.

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