lenny mccallister. and start with you, because i find it fascinating so many undecideds at this point, people considered to be undecideds. officially, 1% who are undecided. 40% call themselves persuadable. that s interesting going into a very persuading process. getting into the churches and local community centers, that s what they re doing. all of those captains trying to persuade you. that s right. at the beginning of the caucus, tuesday night, 8:00, a chance for every team leader from different campaigns to make the case for why they re supporting their guy. so it opens up the door for people called inaudible. on the fence. i m going this way down the road. rick santorum has been surging in every poll across the board in the last several days. frequently people making up their mind in the last minute who can make a difference. ron paul supporters, hard core.
close and personal. don t you? right. absolutely. and if they reject you, if they vote for somebody else, if you come in lower in the polling for the final vote than you thought you would, it is very personal. i think one of the big stories, who doesn t survive iowa? who drops out after iowa or perhaps after new hampshire next week? and right now michele bachmann s not doing well. in iowa. this may be her last go-around. a very personal thing. you re absolutely right. people respond differently to this kind of pressure. lenny mccallister jump in quickly. 60% of the caucusgoers refer to themselves as evangelicals. could be closer to 40% this time around. what is it and what will that effect be? the effect, if it s not the evangelical vote out in, people may start trying to pick the most electable candidate and ignore that aspect of what the candidate is all about. if that s the case, that s the reason why you see mitt romney
so polls are sometimes, belie the truth on the ground, and that s what we see. this isn t just about polling. this is about what we re seeing in reality and i think tuesday night people are going to see a miracle. lenny, any chance of a miracle? there s a chance for a miracle. i mean, she won the straw poll here. here s the thing, though. she hasn t done much since. she s been caught in some bad comments. she s been not doing that great with debates, and she s been effective, but she s been effective against candidates that are now lower in the polls as well. she s been effective against, for example, she s gone after newt gingrich. he s fallen down. he s been very effective she s been very effective going against rick perry. he s lower in the polls now. so what has she been able to do against romney? not much. what has she been able to do against ron paul? obviously not much here in iowa. she has a chance for a miracle. did i think it s going to
and good morning to you. i m ashleigh banfield. and i m zoraida sambolin. it s early start. we re coming to you from the cnn election center this morning. very excited to be here with you. our giant flag in the background. feeling very american, and you know what? it s a good thing. 30 hours or so until things get opened up and iowa caucuses get underway. and incredible coverage headed your way as well. it is 6:01 in the east. new surveillance tape identifies a person of interest in the california arson fires. the new fires may be a part of an arson spree. eight of them they re looking into now. also another very strange story going on in washington state. this man is apparently a suspect in a killing of a ranger in mount rainier national park. apparently supposed to be a routine traffic stop, but if the allegations are true, the man in the picture took off and when a road block was set up decided to shoot a 32-year-old mother of two who was a park ranger. that stor
also, we ve got something very unusual that s happening in mt. rainier. there s been a murder of a park ranger and they re looking for this person. they feel like he s escaped on foot at this point and have had to actually rescue some of the people that have been camping. we ll tell you more details about that. the fat weather service says blizzard condition in the great lakes could make the travel you re trying to execute impossible. isn t this like one of the busiest days of the year for travel. a lot got used to the warmer weather, you know, the nice conditions and snap out of it. bam, wake up. hey, guess what you ll have to snap out of that pre-election lull. we re down to 36 hours before vote time in iowa. talk about shaking hands. i wish they had a shake-oh-meter to know how many hands had been shaken buffett the polls started opening in the iowa caucuses. we have numbers for you. some are surprising. the new york times says it is the worst los angeles