now, but a million people are on the way to fill it up for america s biggest celebration. and 2012 arriving hour by hour around the world. live pictures here. happy new year. hon congress. just three days until the iowa caucuses. cnn s political editor paul steinhauser is in the thick of it live in des moines, iowa. whirlwind day ahead, i m sure, for you, right? no doubt about it, nonstop on the campaign trail. this is the end of december in iowa and it should be cold. let s start with newt gingerich. he was reaching out to voters stai restaurant and bus stop. we ve seen newt gingerich s numbers kind of collapse here. he was the front-runner, but that s not the case any more. he s telling voters, don t count me out. i would ask you to go tuesday night, take all your friends and help us win. i do think this is wide open, no matter what the news media does to try to create some stampede. newt beginning rip s numbers have been going down and rick santorum s numbers have
tonight. what s being done to keep them all safe? we have a live report with preparations. in los angeles, 21 fires and a $61,000 reward. people are scared, authorities are desperate. from the cnn center in atlanta, this is cnn saturday morning. i m e.d. hill. we start this hour in iowa. it is hard to believe, there are only three days left until the first votes are cast in the republican presidential race. it seems like we ve been waiting for a year or so. so, of course, all the candidates are in iowa. try and shake every last hand or are they? paul steinhauser joins us now from des moines. so is mitt romney there? he s on his way back, e.d. he s right now in new hampshire. this morning, he was in hampton, new hampshire, a breakfast that e5 . remember, new hampshire goes one week after iowa. iowa goes on tuesday. new hampshire goes second in the nation. romney was here yesterday and when he left, he left the keys of the bus in good hands, with chris christie. he endorsed
state until the final push. what the heck is a caucus any way? and are you looking for a job? one employer says you better not smoke. we ll show you how they are testing job applicants for nicotine. happy new year to you. if you re celebrating new zealand style. that s because it s midnight there. let s look at auckland. there it is. they are among the first to ring in the new year. they do it in amazing style. we will spend the next couple hours showing you the new year s celebrations from around the world as the clock strikes midnight in various parts of the world. there s a new year and perhaps changes for the better. iran says it has no plans to close the strait of hormuz. the country had said they would block the strait if sanctions on iran were enforced. reports said they fired a long-range missile during the training, but now a senior commander says they didn t, but will in the next few days. after complaints by defense secretary leon panetta, egypt says it will
it s going to be hilarious. stay home. deep on cnn. stay with us. the countdown to the republican caucuses. the first contest over who will face president obama in november. we ll take you live to des moines. and a corporation bows to public pressure. verizon convenience fee, fuhgedaboudit. captions by vitac www.vitac.com we start with iowa and the republican presidential race. there are just three days now until the first votes are cast, which means plenty of action this weekend in places like goblin goat and bloomers. a taste of what potential voters are hearing. we are just a few days, you know, before, before an important election. some people say, why does iowa have so much clout? it s a small state, and it has such great meaning, because it s sending a message around the country. a week ago we in last place. so right now people are thinking my whole emphasis on brain science coming in directly from dealing see that ambush, dealing with the real probl
thwart a potentially catastrophic event, the likes of which the city of tampa has not seen and hopefully never will. i want to bring in david mattingly who has been covering this for us all day long. i want to begin with the fact that i m glad we re sitting here telling this version of the story. this could have gone a different direction. a lot of this is all in thanks to this unsung hero who we may never know who this individual is who tipped police off. what did the police ultimately find? what they ultimately found in the bedroom of his apartment where he was living, found bomb making materials, found shrapnel and wiring. they found things that you could definitely make an explosive device with, but they did not find anything that resembled a firearm. there were no guns there. that was a relief. no evidence whatsoever to suggest that there was anybody else involved. again, another source of relief. but he did have the materials there to make some device that is could