I said that he should drop out in November, and really, I don’t know why it took so long.  Guiliani really should too, but with Super Tuesday only  a couple of weeks away, he’ll stick it out to see how the rest goes.  And don’t forget Florida next week.  The way I see it, Romney is probably the going to get the nomination.  He’s picked up steam since Wyoming and nobody else has really shown any sustained run at it.  I think we’ll see Guiliani pick up a few delegates in the next few weeks, but not enough to make up for his dismal showing so far.  McCain will continue to gain ground, but again, too little too late. Huckabee, even though he’s my guy, will continue to sit where he is and maybe maintain a 2nd to Romney.

In the end, I think the biggest thing was that Thompson didn’t have the cash to finish out and didn’t see the point in continuing on fumes if the best he could do was about 13%.

I’m beginning to wonder if we’ll see a decent Independent or Third Party candidate.  I’ve heard rumors of Bloomberg, but haven’t really looked into him much, so can’t say whether I would consider him a decent candidate or not.

Two surprises that I did see in the results last night were the surge of Edwards to beat Clinton and Fred Thompson beating McCain ( if only very slightly).  Thompson I can see.  I’ve thought he was under-polling for a while now.  And McCain has been slipping.  But Edwards, I don’t understand.  Well, it’s not that I don’t understand it, I just didn’t think it would happen.  I didn’t think he had the popularity this time around.  Apparently, I was wrong.

Other things of note in last nights vote were the truly poor results for Guiliani.  I’ve never liked him and apparently, there are those that agree with me.  He only got 4% of the vote.  Even Ron Paul got 10%.  Dodd and Biden only got 1% and immediately dropped out of the race.

On to New Hampshire!

I hope they are wrong.  There’s something about Guiliani that I just don’t like.  Can’t stand in fact.  I have absolutely no logical reason for it, although if pressed I could probably come up with a couple.  In fact, I’m not so sure that I like any of the Republican candidates.  And I won’t get started on the Democrats.  Where’s Ross Perot when you need him?   Just Kidding.

Other interesting notes from the results of the poll.  Guiliani gets a nod as most electable.  Huckabee gets least electable.  Thompson gets most conservative as well as most fiscally conservative and toughest on illegal immigration. No wonder he’s the one the bloggers would like to see get the nod.  Those are some pretty hot button issues.

Oddly, Guiliani gets a close nod over McCain in the Foreign Policy question.  Is it because of 9/11?  Do we assume that all foreign policy will deal with Muslims and Guiliani will be better at dealing with them due to 9/11?  And McCain?  Does being a POW give you special insight into Foreign Policy?  Honestly, I haven’t read any of the candidates foreign policy statements, but I just found it odd that the man that came to the forefront during 9/11 and a former prisoner of war were the ones that were deemed best at foreign policy.

It should be noted that the poll was based on the responses of only 61 bloggers.  This only makes it slightly more accurate than a CNN poll and just as skewed as a FOX News poll.  As such, it should be taken with a grain of salt.  And maybe a couple kernels of pepper.

Sources close to Dobson say that within the next ten days he is coordinating an endorsement plan with the presidential campaign of former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee. According to a Huckabee insider in Iowa, the event would be staged in that state at a rally, followed by a bus tour across the state, and an appearance by Huckabee on Dobson’s radio show, which is heard nationally.

An endorsement from Dr. Dobson is akin to an endorsement from the entire Christian movement.  The article did update with information that Dr. Dobson’s office denies that he will be giving an endorsement.

My guess is that it is very possible that he will be giving an endorsement of Huckabee.  It makes some sense as Dobson is probably the most conservative of the Christian leaders as well as one of the most trusted unlike Pat Robertson.   But we won’t get into my opinion of shylock preachers.

Either way, this news, if it is true, has to be welcomed with much celebration in the Huckabee corner.  It could potentially mean the difference between his candidacy and that of his fellow running mates.  An equalizer of sorts.

On the Republican side, the Hawkeye poll showed that former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney has widened his overall lead by 8 percentage points, to 36.2%. But Mike Huckabee, a former governor of Arkansas, has gained ground despite spending just $1.7 million compared to Romney’s $53.6 million. Huckabee is up from less than 2 % in the same poll in August to 12.8%, putting him in a statistical tie for second place with Rudy Giuliani who garnered 13.1%. Giuliani had spent $30.2 million as of September 30, according to Federal Election Commission reports.

Maybe it was all Chuck Norris?  I doubt it.  Somebody better explain to me how a guy spends less than 1/25th of the frontrunner and is gaining on him?  Maybe there is something to this Huckabee guy?  I still think he’s too far to the right to get a decent vote even if he does win the candidacy.  Giuliani just rubs me the wrong way.  I’m not even sure why.  I haven’t officially got an opinion on Romney and at the moment, my favorites are Huckabee and Thompson.

On the other side of the poll, the Democrats are all bunched up at the top with Clinton and Obama at a near deadlock with 28.9% and 26.6% respectively.  Third place John Edwards dropped 6% to take in 20% of the polltakers.

Now, the problem with this and many other polls is in the interpretation.  The total amount of people taking the poll was 285 for the Republican poll and 306 for the Democrats.  What is that?  About .05% of the population of Iowa?  Not exactly a representative poll.  And they still claim only a 5.8% margin of error.  But that’s enough to launch John Edwards into first place if you skew it just right.  And all of a sudden the Republican race is a lot closer than it maybe is.

As my statistics professor in college once said, “A good statistician can make any poll look good for any situation.”