we re live on the las vegas strip where in just four hours, the republican hopefuls will face off in a cnn western presidential debate. tonight, herman cain is the candidate to beat. since the last debate one week ago in new hampshire, herman cain has continued to rise in the polls and is now the front-runner for the republican presidential nomination. he is joining me now. he s here in the situation room. we re in las vegas. mr. cain, thanks very much for coming in. how does that feel to be called the front-runner running for the nomination? the way it feels is that you got this big bull s eye on your back so that keeps gets bigger. it feels great, but as you know, the challenge is how do we continue that momentum and we believe we know how to do it. they re all going to come after you tonight. i m ready. have you been practicing? what are you doing? what i always do. in other words, i make sure i know where i stand on all the solutions i m putting on the table.
from celebration to confusion in less than one day. this time yesterday we were reporting how rebels were gaining on tripoli. international leaders talking about a new political era and rebels bragging they had captured gadhafi s son. then saif appeared overnight and said he lured them into a trap. as we look at the live pictures out of tripoli, we still don t know if gadhafi is in his compound or not but nato jets are flying low over his compound. at least one explosion has been reported. nato won t confirm any bombing, however. and rebels are engaged in fierce fighting near the compound as well. as we heard just a moment ago, a rebel official reporting they have actually breached the gates there. we are hitting the story hard with multiple correspondents on the ground. matthew chance in the heart of tripoli. arwa damon reporting from the city s airport and sarah sidener and frederik pleitgen is in ben gaza. state to matthew chance who is caught up in a pretty dangerous situ