And Down the Stretch They Come!

The races on both sides remain extremely fluid; Giuliani is hoping that his firewall states are Florida, NJ and NY, Thompson is making his move while Romney and Huck are holding on to their respective leads.

On the Dem side, Obama continues his momentum and to be honest, we've seen the maturation of a very good politician. He's handled the muck thrown at him by Hillary with aplomb and gives it back without seeming to be dragged down. Hillary seems desperate by all accounts--starting when she went as far back as Obama's grammar school papers to having one of her minions revive the drug story to Bob Kerrey resorting to the Barack Hussein Obama card. Edwards has not gotten any traction of late and at this point seems an also-ran.

But the real story may be John McCain. McCain has picked himself up off the mat (and not for the first time) and thrust himself back into the campaign. He's made a move in New Hampshire and who the hell knows about Iowa. If he could rack up a win in the state that cost him in 2000--South Carolina--and gain the momentum, who knows.

As for the most political savvy move of the week, Huck said he would pardon Border Patrol agents Compean and Ramos who were sentenced to a decade in prison for shooting an illegal alien drug dealer. Smart move as that has been a major issue to the hard core base who follows politics on a daily basis. The fact that no other candidate has even mentioned those two wrongfully imprisoned men shows that they're not paying as close attention to the base as the should.

It's getting to be crunch time folks and we'll see shifts and stalls in the next week and a half. I'm still hoping that Huckabee is in the stall category and that Thompson puts it into fifth gear and makes a move that'll garner him a win in SC.