A new poll out of Iowa shows Newt's numbers dropping while solidifying the neck-and-neck narrative between Romney and Paul:
Romney drew the support of 23 percent of likely caucus-goers in Iowa … ahead of Paul, at 21 percent. They are followed by Santorum at 15 percent, Texas Gov. Rick Perry at 14 percent, Gingrich at 13 percent and Minnesota Rep. Michele Bachmann at 6 percent. … The NBC-Marist poll conducted in late November had Gingrich in the lead among likely caucus-goers at 28 percent, Romney and Paul tied at 19 percent, Perry at 10 percent, Bachmann at 7 percent and Santorum at 6 percent.
Blumenthal and Silver have more on Santorum's streak. A reader can't resist:
I for one hope that Santorum makes a strong third place showing, only to hear him remark without irony, "I am nearly number two."
Rick Hertzberg predicts a nasty end to the Gingrich campaign:
Newt does not respond well to nonrecognition of his world-historical destiny. His exit will not be pretty. He may act out. There is a certain wan dignity, though, in the fact that the "baggage" that is proving to be Newt’s undoing is not so much his rabbity love life or his lucrative, un-historian-like subprime lobbying as it is his past forays into unorthodox decency, such as recognizing that mass roundups and deportations of undocumented immigrants and their children is inhumane as well as impractical, acknowledging that global warming is a reality, not just a secular-socialist hoax designed to crush freedom, and (the latest news from five years ago) suggesting that medical care should be available to everybody—all hundred per cent, which necessarily includes even more of the undeserving, the improvident, and the ungodly than does the ninety-nine per cent.
The Dish 