florida is a big prize, with 50 delegates up for grabs in a winner-take-all contest. it s time to turn to cnn political reporter peter hamby who s live in plantation, florida, a suburb just west of ft. lauderdale. reporter: they are not letting up on newt gingrich. i ve got to tell you, every television ad i ve seen has been negative and most of them have within negative from romney or his allies against newt gingrich. today they re out with a brutal new ad that s sat rating air waves here. it features tom brokaw talking for 30 seconds in a news clip from 1997 after the house voted to sanction gingrich when he was speaker. take a look at this ad that s running here, gary. tonight he has on his own record the judgment of his peers, democrat and rip alike, by an overwhelming vote they found him guilty of ethics violations. they charged him a very large financial penalty and they raised several of them raised several questions about his future effectiveness. reporter: so
we ll see more of you tomorrow morning as well. meantime, this is a pivotal day in the 2012 presidential race. the nation s first southern gop primary is happening right now in south carolina and the contest promises to be quite the cliff hanger. we ll get you the latest dramatic poll numbers in just a moment. but first, the two leading contenders in the state, newt gingrich and mitt romney, actually ended up campaigning in the same spot this morning. tommy s country ham house in greenville, south carolina. cnn national political correspondent jim acosta was there to see it all unfold. so, jim, for a while we thought the two candidates were actually going to be at the restaurant at the same time, but it didn t quite happen that way, right? reporter: it did not happen quite that way, that s right. mitt romney showed up about a half hour earlier than expected, trying to get the upper ham, i guess you could say, if i could try that pun one more time. and he made it he ma
middle-class families pay. we ll explain what s going on. i m wolf blitzer. you re in the situation room. dramatic new developments today in the cruise ship disaster off the coast of italy after blasting holes in the capsized costa philosopconcord the massive liner hits rocks and ripped open the hull friday night. it shows the dramatic escape as people clamor off the sinks vessel. the ship s captain is under house arrest, and he may face charges of manslaughter and abandoning ship. now a stunning the transcript between outrages authorities on shore and the captain. matthew chance is faults this unfold. what s the latest, matthew? reporter: these transcripts and recordings that have emerged of astonishing. they show conversations that were taking place between the captain of the costa concordia. his name is francesco scampino. the coast guard asking about the situation. he sounds confused. then emerges much to the astonishment of is the coast guard that the captain
they were hanging in them and children were crying and people screaming and jumping. we heard crew members jumped at the end into the water. my goodness. frightening moments. a journalist is where survivors are being taken and joins us by phone. barbie, what is the latest on the rescue mission, the search for the missing people and if they know what the ship ran into. reporter: well, right now the rescue operations are sort of winding town. darkness has fallen here and it s starting to get a little bit cold. the divers worked all afternoon searching the underwater components of that ship on its side in search of bodies. they have not ruled out that there will be more fatalities from this accident. several people, though, that did get off the boat at the port prior to this one have come forward to say they got off. so we ve taken the number of missing from 70 to i think the last count was 51. but that s still a considerable number. they don t know, you know, if these peopl
fredricka whitfield is here. take it away. thank you so much. see you tomorrow. thank you. we ve got lots straight ahead including, of course, there s no teime to waste in ne hampshire. in three days the state holds the primary and every presidential candidate is there today trying to win over voters in a contest with so much at stake. joe johns is live with the bus. in manchester, joe, most of the new hampshire polls showing mitt romney leading by more than 20 points. what are his rivals doing to try to make up some ground? well, the question is how much are they trying to make up ground on mitt romney and whether they are fighting amongst themselves for second place. it looks like a contest for the runner up position. mitt romney appears to be running so strong in the polls. that means people like ron paul, newt gingrich, rick santorum moving around the state. a couple more events before the real gauntlet begins, tonight and tomorrow. two debates in the space of 2