A couple of weeks ago I wrote about the pandering Presidential politics of Clinton, McCain and Obama. McCain pandered on the gas tax and Hillary and Barack pandered on trade.  read more »

Florida’s closed Republican primary was supposed to be John McCain’s undoing.

Tomorrow’s vote marks the first time balloting in a G.O.P. contest is restricted only to registered Republicans, leaving out the independents who boosted Mr. McCain’s performance in New Hampshire, Michigan, and South Carolina. At the mercy of a party base that despises him for his positions on immigration, campaign finance reform and a dozen other apostasies, the thinking goes, McCain faces the prospect of defeat at the hands of Mitt Romney.  read more »

BOCA RATON, Fla.—Rudy Giuliani, wearing a dark suit and dark yarmulke, emphasized his ties to Florida’s Jewish voters in a speech at a modern orthodox synagogue here today.

“I have a long-standing and strong community with the Jewish community here and in Israel,” said Giuliani. He told the congregants at the Hahn Judaic Campus of the Boca Raton Synagogue about a trip to Israel during which he witnessed what he called the reunification of the Ethiopian Jews.  read more »

Rudolph Giuliani is about to speak at the Boca Raton Synagogue: The Hahn Judaic Campus.  read more »

ORLANDO, Fla.—Between two campaign events at the Rosen Centre Hotel here, Rudy Giuliani held a brief press conference in which he sought to portray himself as the reasonable, positive and polite presidential candidate disapproving of the negative exchanges between John McCain and Mitt Romney.

In other words, Giuliani, once the Republican front-runner, has been relegated to the long-shot role played by John Edwards on the Democratic side: that of the suddenly awakened moral conscience tsk-tsk-ing on the front-runners’ shoulders.  read more »

From the AP:

Former Tennessee Sen. Fred Thompson quit the Republican presidential race on Tuesday, after a string of poor finishes in early primary and caucus states.

"Today, I have withdrawn my candidacy for president of the United States. I hope that my country and my party have benefited from our having made this effort," Thompson said in a statement.

During tonight's debate, at the back end of the media room, far away from the mainstream press (and cut off thereby from reliable wireless internet service), sat a bunch of young writers. They wore ski caps, flannel shirts and had a healthy dose of acne. They also had a nickname for themselves: the Backseat Bloggers.

"Hi, nice to meet you, and yes, we can speak," said Brian Lawson, a 22-year-old, who runs the blog New Hampshire Presidential Watch. "This is the fifth debate I've been to and they're still saying the same thing," he said.

In the background, TVs and speakers showed Republicans were trading barbs. But with wireless internet on the fritz, Lawson said he was making up the time by playing solitaire. He was also making new friends.  read more »

NASHUA, N.H.—The rushed primary schedule gives reporters only five days in New Hampshire, with virtually no sleep since they finished up in Iowa late last night. This morning in New Hampshire, they were feeling it.  read more »

Rudy Giuliani's campaign is both soliciting donations from supporters and still trying to make the case that they were right not to compete in Iowa, and to compete only half-heartedly in New Hampshire, even though the former mayor has effectively been dropped from the national political discussion in recent weeks.

Here is the fund-raising letter that campaign manager Michael DuHaime sent out this morning, in which he uses the now-familiar reasoning that Rudy will be fine as long as he wins in Florida, New York and New Jersey.

Whether those states will take him seriously without a good showing in a single early primary is another story.

Email after the jump.  read more »

Fortune smiled on Mike Huckabee today.

The former Arkansas Governor, suddenly the front-runner in Iowa, was supposed to come under intense fire from Mitt Romney at this afternoon’s Republican debate in Des Moines—the last head-to-head encounter between the candidates before the January 3 caucuses.

And the set-up seemed perfect for Mr. Romney, whose Mormonism has probably contributed to the stunning rise of Mr. Huckabee, a personable Baptist preacher who may be more culturally compatible with Iowa’s formidable bloc of Christian conservatives.  read more »