Clark Wins in New Hampshire!

Well, the early voting in two super small towns at least. I'm sorry did my title deceive you?

"Clark won Dixville's Notch with 8 votes. Sen. John Kerry had 3, Sen. John Edwards 2 and Howard Dean and Sen. Joe Lieberman 1 each. Clark received 6 votes in Hart's Location. Kerry had 5, Dean 3 and Edwards 2.," reports the AP.

Clark was the only one who bothered to go up to these tiny towns who have the historical privilege of casting the first ballots at 12:01 AM last night. [If you really care to know the history behind it, it all stems back to railroad workers who couldn't vote except for right before their shift that early, but Hart's Location was the original hamlet and then one time they canceled and Dixville's Notch got it but no one seemed to mind. ]

The General is doing a 10 county tour today in a sprint around the state as a last-minute rally. Many on his staff think the idea is a big waste of time and effort. "He's going to spend 15 hours traveling and see 300 people," said one disgusted advance team member on Sunday.

Finally, an Insider Account on the Dean Campaign in NH

This comes straight from the horse's mouth so to speak, from a volunteer with the Dean campaign that's a friend of mine (let's call her "Jaime")

"Hey Dave! Sorry the Deanies were so mean! The Deanies here in
Claremont are very nice, but sadly no Clark people are here.
The Edwards folk are, and the Kerry people are too, and there
is 1 Lieberman guy. The Kerry people are awful- they spray
paint our signs! But everyone else is pretty nice.

I went to a Dean rally last night in Laconia- supposedly
there were 1200 people! I dunno. It was really cool- there
was a HILARIOUSLY cheesy children's choir, complete with- I
kid you not- a wooden eagle on a pole. And a great speech-
Dean is so much better live than on TV. Judy Dean was there
for like .5 seconds. The crowd went WILD for her- I guess
mystique is good for popularity.

We canvassed our whole county- there was just not much to do
today! Our county, next to VT, is expected to go 70% Dean, so
I don't know how good a picture I'm getting. But definitely
I'll never trust the media again- things feel VERY different
on the ground. The volunteers are all wonderful, of course
(though some are, well, strange and slightly scary in their
zeal) and the staff, for staff, is chill. Everyone feels very
positive and confident that regardless of how things go
tomorrow, we're going to win in the end. Lots of people have
been talking about what state they're going to next. General
consensus is that, worst case scenario, we want Edwards as
the nominee, then Clark, last Kerry. Lieberman is DOA, at
least here. I've seen 1- one- Lieberman sign. Is he even
campaigning here? New Hampshire folk seem so sick of everyone- they're way more polite about canvassing than people in any
other state would be, and are really interested and willing
to listen and like Dean- but they really just want all the
candidates and pollsters to stop bothering them. I suspect
some will vote for whoever has bugged them least- so maybe
Lieberman will get some votes!

Well, that's all for now. Good luck tomorrow- though no
matter how you guys place I think Clark can spin it into
victory. We will be ok with first or second, but it would be
so great to win. Being here has been amazing. "

"p.s. my gut instinct on the numbers? It's going to be super
close. If Kerry loses, it'll be a big story, and may deflate
his team a bit, but ultimately if it's Dean or Kerry, in either
order, no impact on the race. Clark wins with a third or 4th,
and only loses if there's a Lieberman surprise. Edwards had a
lot of people here yesterday, but it turns out they were all
bused in- if he needs that, he's not doing well here (and may
not need to. I think he thinks he doesn't need to do well
here. I also think he actually DOES need to do ok and will
lose some cred if Clark trounces him.)"