He’s rising in New Hampshire, struggling in South Carolina, and uncompetitive in Iowa.
John McCain met with volunteers and staffers at his new Nashua, NH, campaign office Friday. He offered his own assessment of where he stands in the three early states, starting with New Hampshire.

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Real Clear Politics, which averages national poll numbers, shows McCain in third place in New Hampshire with about 16% support. Mitt Romney leads with 33.7%.
In South Carolina, RCP puts the Senator at fifth with about 10%. Mike Huckabee is in front with 17.8%.
In Iowa, McCain has about 6%, with Huckabee pulling away from the pack at 29.2%.

Republican presidential candidate Fred Thompson continued to rally support yesterday in South Carolina, a state the former Tennessee senator refers to as “my neck of the woods,” and one where his poll numbers remain competitive.

Making stops in such places as Greenville, Greer, and Spartanburg, Thompson touted his consistent conservative record and foreign affairs experience during his time in the United States Senate. “I’m just about the only guy in this race who hasn’t lost an election,” Mr. Thompson said, “and the guy you saw yesterday is the guy you see today…and it’s the same guy you’ll see tomorrow.”

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While greeting supporters in coffee shops and restaurants around the state, Thompson addressed a variety of issues ranging from illegal immigration to the Second Amendment to South Carolina’s startling high school drop-out rate. He also offered his reaction to a new U.S. intelligence report that claims Iran ended its nuclear weapons program four years ago. The senator said he was skeptical of such a conclusion, adding that he’s lost confidence in the country’s intelligence-gathering capabilities.

“I hope that they are accurate with this assessment, but right now, I don’t have the confidence in our own intelligence capabilities to make that assessment,” he told a crowd of supporters at a gun shop in Greer, South Carolina. “One thing that crosses my mind is that this is information that the Iranians have put out, that they want us to kind of relax a little bit.”

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A sense of humor sometimes provides welcome relief in a campaign increasing in intensity. That’s not difficult for Mr. Thompson, who some say is never without a witty remark–even when pressed on tough issues. At a gathering of supporters in a Greenville restaurant on Tuesday, one man asked Thompson what he plans to do on his first day if elected President:

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Okatie, SC — Rudy Giuliani brushed off reporter questions today about a controversial news report detailing potential financial misconduct during his time as New York City mayor, simply telling reporters “we’ve already explained it.”

Hours before Wednesday’s GOP debate, the Politico newspaper reported that “obscure” city offices were billed for NYPD security costs related to Giuliani’s trips to the Hamptons in the summer of 2001, where he was then conducting an extra-marital affair. (See more here and here.)

One day after conducting several interviews about the subject, where Giuliani called the story a “political hit job” given the debate timing and his conduct in office “perfectly appropriate,” he refused to respond to multiple questions as his usually accommodating campaign staff aggressively attempted to prevent access to him as he exited a South Carolina town hall meeting.

While Giuliani does not usually hold a formal q and a period after town halls, the media traditionally are allowed to film him shaking hands with voters following his events and he will sometimes answer reporter questions. But today, campaign staff repeatedly told reporters to keep away from Giuliani–sometimes physically getting in the way of journalists attempting to film or shout questions at the GOP candidate.

Regardless of the fact that Giuliani took a pass today, the campaign says they are confident with their defense of Giuliani’s conduct and made staff available to the media for comment hours after the story was released Wednesday. They maintain:

1. There was no fiscal mismanagement or impropriety.
2. The NYPD reimbursed city offices for any initial costs.
3. Given that he already received 24/7 NYPD security as mayor, there was no need to hide security costs despite the nature of his visits.

The bottom line of course is that they don’t want to keep the negative story alive by having him comment further, but given media interest, it is inevitable that Giuliani will continue to get questions about the matter. Giuliani heads to New Hampshire tonight where he will conduct a weekend swing through the Granite State.

Anderson, SC

“I’d like to know what conservatism means to you.” That was the question for John McCain at a town hall meeting Tuesday in South Carolina.

Straightforward question, but hardly a simple one. The Senator later admitted to reporters, he really had to think it through while responding.

His answer in the town hall took a full three minutes. Here’s the abbreviated version:

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Hillary Clinton told a mostly black audience in South Carolina that former Secretary of State Colin Powell would make a great envoy to the rest of the world to send a signal that “the era of cowboy diplomacy is over.”

Picking up the endorsement of the Upstate Ministers, an influential group of black preachers, Clinton told the crowd, “I have said I won’t even wait until I’m inaugurated, but as soon as I’m elected I’m going to be asking distinguished Americans of both parties — people like Colin Powell for example, and others who can represent our country well” to travel the world as ambassadors of good will. The “others” include, she said, “someone I know very well” — a sly reference to her very popular husband that drew big cheers.

The campaign says Sen Clinton has mentioned Powell’s name as an example of someone she’d enlist for her diplomatic mission, but she rarely mentions names besides that of her husband during that section of her standard stump speech.

The endorsers themselves seemed hyper-aware that they were supporting Hillary instead of her main rival, Barack Obama. Introducing the ministers, State Rep Harold Mitchell said he himself got caught up in the “hooplah” of having a black candidate, but that “you’ve got to peel that off.” He added, “once I got to look at the facts, there’s no doubt this is the candidate to take back the White House.”

And referencing Obama’s “politics of hope,” Rev Stacey Mills of Mt View Baptist in Greenville said, “We need to look for a leader that is ready to lead right now. We don’t need to be filling our head with hopes and dreams, we need somebody who can take the oval office and lead us into this next generation.”

Here’s Hillary talking about picking Powell as a potential envoy.

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After a quick Thanksgiving trip to Iraq, Senator John McCain is lashing out at Democrats who won’t say the surge is working.

Campaigning in South Carolina, a state with a large military and veterans’ population, McCain insists the U.S. military is making progress in Iraq.

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Senator Biden released a statement Monday saying that the attempt by “John McCain and Rudy Giuliani to defend the Bush-Cheney troop surge in Iraq totally misses the point – and is misleading to the American people. Security in Iraq is better, thanks in no small measure to our troops. But there is no evidence – none – that the surge is succeeding in achieving its stated objective: to allow Iraqis to come together politically.”

McCain maintains there has been some political progress in Iraq, but admits that he’s frustrated by the Maliki government.

Barack Obama often jokes that his family resembles the United Nations. The son of a white mother from Kansas and a Kenyan father whose half-Indonesian sister is married to a Chinese-Canadian told a Berlin, New Hampshire, audience Sunday that he considers himself a proud African American.

“I’ve got family members that look like Margaret Thatcher and family members that look like Bernie Mac,” Obama joked to a multiracial crowd at North High School in Des Moines earlier in the day. The crowd laughed and applauded.

The candidate often cites his diverse family as an asset. It’s because he has a grandmother who still lives in an African village, for example, that Obama can relate to the world, he says on the campaign trail. “Even though I may be African American,” the candidate noted earlier this month in Chariton, Iowa, “I come from a family that has folks of every stripe in it, and so I think I am able to bridge divisions between people.”

But race is something that Obama, who would be the first African American president, must deal with very delicately on the trail. He must appeal to Red State and rural voters who may be hesitant to elect a black president while ensuring African American voters he is “black enough” and electable.

“I wouldn’t be running if I didn’t think I could win,” Obama told a largely African American crowd in Manning, SC, last month. “So the brothers and sisters out there telling folks I can’t win – don’t defeat ourselves. Get that out of your mind that you can’t do something. I don’t believe in you can’t do something. Yes we can do something,” he implored.

That same day he told a Greenville, SC, NAACP group, “You can trust I will fight for you as president because I don’t just talk the talk; I walk the walk. I’ve been there. I’ve been along side you. I have the bruises and the battle scars to show.”

Obama is also sure not to exploit race as an issue. He doesn’t often volunteer his views on race relations in his day-to-day campaigning, probably because he does not want to “play the race card,” as the press is prone to describe such talk.

When he does talk about race in America, it’s a subject of note that only a candidate with Barack Obama’s background can talk about with authority, as he did at his town hall forum focusing on urban issues in Des Moines Saturday.

Obama began, “There is no doubt that the blight of racism and discrimination is less than it was 30 years ago. Anybody who says differently I think is not paying attention. I could not be standing here were it not for the extraordinary efforts that were made on behalf by a previous generation. I stand on the shoulders of people who fought for justice, who fought for equality.”

Here is a montage of the senator’s remarks:

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Campaigning in South Carolina on Tuesday, Republican presidential candidate Fred Thompson stopped at a NASCAR-themed restaurant in Myrtle Beach and told a packed crowd of diners that he was in “home territory.” Thompson–who is in a tight three-way race there with GOP rivals Rudy Giuliani and Mitt Romney–called himself “Mr. NASCAR” and joked about his role as Bill France Sr. in the movie “Days of Thunder.”

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After speaking about his plan to revitalize the country’s national defense, Thompson remarked on his recent endorsement from the National Right to Life Committee.

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Obama’s Campaign Manager David Plouffe sent out an email Tuesday to “Interested Parties.” Basically that means it’s sent to a large group of reporters and it’s usually something juicy.

The email was entitled “Obama Gains Strength at Critical Time,” and was meant to be a look at how the campaign sees their candidate’s chances and/or how the campaign would like the press to interpret Obama’s chances in the early primary and caucus states.

Obama is doing well, the memo stated, because Clinton cannot unify and Senator John Edwards thinks that compromise is a “dirty word.”

In Iowa:

The Clinton camp is lowering expectations despite the fact that Iowa is “make or break for them.” Plouffe continued, “Which is why they will likely start planting signs, instead of questions, in Iowa.”

Of  Edwards – “We see no signs of Edwards growing outside of his core base from 2004.”

In New Hampshire:

Recent polls show that Hillary Clinton’s lead has been cut in half. “Amongst voters who say they know both Obama and Clinton equally well, we actually take a lead outside the margin for error, and in our internal polling as well as public polling, among those following the race closely, Obama and Clinton are in a dead heat.”

In Nevada:

What happens in Nevada…..(no, guess again) will be influenced by what happens in Iowa and New Hampshire. “Therefore, what the turnout is and the pace of decision making is not fully known.”

In South Carolina:

Obama has not run a single ad in the state, the campaign noted, and yet he is still doing better than John Edwards, who won the primary in 2004. “We also believe that Edwards’ support in South Carolina, if he is no longer in the race or is a weakened candidate, is much more inclined to be supportive of Obama.”

The Eleven February 5th States:

“As best we can tell, Clinton only has a meaningful presence in California and New Jersey,” the memo read. “Edwards has no formal presence in the February 5th states.”

Here is Senator Obama himself, talking strategy at a Monday town hall forum in New Hampshire.

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Isn’t it ironic? Independent expenditures helped defeat John McCain in 2000. That made him all the more determined to pass BCRA…bipartisan campaign fiannce reform act…to the unintiated…McCain Feingold to everyone else. McCain calls it Ironic, Romney calls it dripping with irony..

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A group trying to help McCain finds their assistance unwelcome.