i m overly candid, i get in trouble. having nose-dived in the poll he is acknowledged he could come in fourth in iowa. considering i m 20 points ahead in some other states, it would be foolish for me not to stay in the race. it s a long way from here to picking a nominee. he went further on his campaign bus. we will be better in new hampshire and better in south carolina. is it safe to say south carolina is now your best chance for a win? sure. it always was. south carolina has always been, because i m a georgian and real ties there. because massachusetts candidate doesn t play very well there. there are a lot of reasons why south carolina will be different. but look must it be the firewall win it s do or die? not do or die but much better shape if we win it. the latest rasmussen poll has mitt romney and ron paul virtually tied and rick santorum surging to third. american research group poll has romney ahead and gingrich in second, leading paul and santorum. gingr
Of spending within the traditional medicare system. nobody will get out of it. nobody will choose the more efficient market alternative. offering choice does not solve the problem. we don t have provisions for cut in medicare. we think they will choose a private market alternative. if they don t? it won t work. it s based on the assumption that people make the choice. gingrich and romney plans are similar. doing nothing to control spending and medicare, the gingrich plan takes the bigger risk. bret? bret: jim, thank you. it appears that yet another threat of a government shutdown will go down to final hour, with less than 30 hours to go until that deadline. mike emanuel shows there are signs of movement but only signs. the threatened government shutdown seem to change everything. they worked on the final unresolved sticking point as
Early to count romney out here. he has probably one of the strongest organizations in the state. the campaign has been working hard. they have been managing the expectation well here. it looks like speaker gingrich plateaued at this point hecht does not have the underbelly of support from the organization, the army of people that some of the other candidates do, which is why his performance here tonight is really important. bret: what about the possibility. romney win in iowa would shake up the whole thing. it would. conventionm wisdom he will do well in new hampshire. that is likely to be the case. a win in iowa and convincing win in new hampshire, maybe this wouldn t be the chaotic post debate primary process we thought we d see. bret: on the issue of entitlement reform. it became an issue over recent days. number of candidates go after newt gingrich her his lack of support and paul ryan original
Hours of a referendum on newt gingrich s 40 years in public life, it s a disaster for him. bret: right. steve brown s piece talking to folks around here about what they want to see in tonight s debate, a they don t want to see. they point back to tim pawlenty when he went on the attack of congresswoman bachmann in our debate in iowa ahead of the straw poll and they said they didn t like that at all. they don t. it hurts the attacker sometimes even more than the attack. but it still does damage. that is what you see right now with mitt romney. the harder he hits gingrich, he does drive up his own negatives and reinforce it. what choice do other candidates have now? bachmann, santorum, they have to put points on the board. i think that mitt romney s ideal life would be that he doesn t have to go after gingrich a great deal. but some of the other candidates lower in the polls like santorum, like bachmann who are struggling to get some elevation, to be the alternative to romney, th
The remarks are part of a romney ad. i don t think right wing social engineering is more desirable than social enginee engineering. he accused him of supporting the original plan. he praised ryan and supported keeping traditional medicare as an option that gingrich does as well. he wanted to be a voluntary choice. medicare has $36 trillion in unfunded promises. other republicans and democratic plan limit the medicare spending. you don t slow the growth