Giuliani Loses Lead In Republican Race  —  Ex-Mayor Is Tied With Romney In National Poll of Republicans  —  WASHINGTON — Rudy Giuliani has lost his national lead in the Republican presidential race, creating the party's most competitive nomination fight in decades just two weeks before voting starts.

TOM TANCREDO TO DROP OUT OF PRESIDENTIAL RACE  —  Republican presidential candidate Tom Tancredo plans to drop out of the race during an announcement Thursday afternoon in Des Moines, Iowa, GOP sources close to the campaign have told FOX News.  —  Tancredo, who has aggressively pushed …

The Politico Story on Thompson is Wrong (Update: Not Just Wrong.  Really, Really Wrong)  —  From Dan Riehl we have this story about an allegedly less-than-stellar campaign stop for Fred Thompson.  I say “allegedly” because there's at least one large portion of the story that did not happen as written.

Tucker Attacks John Edwards For Remembering Homeless Vets In Holiday Ad  —  On Wednesday's Tucker, the hopefully soon to be unemployed host gets riled up because Democratic presidential candidate, John Edwards, had the nerve to mention homeless veterans and those less fortunate in his holiday ad.

Congress Averts Higher Tax Bill for Middle Class  —  WASHINGTON — Congress on Wednesday gave final approval to a plan that will spare millions of middle-class taxpayers higher taxes in the coming months.  The White House welcomed the development and said President Bush would sign the bill.

EPA Chief Denies Calif. Limit on Auto Emissions  —  Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Stephen L. Johnson yesterday denied California's petition to limit greenhouse gas emissions from cars and trucks, overruling the unanimous recommendation of the agency's legal and technical staffs.

Kristol, Krauthammer Are Out of Time  —  Bill Kristol.  —  Two conservative Time magazine columnists are on their way out the door: Neither William Kristol nor longtime contributor Charles Krauthammer will be on contract with the magazine starting next month.

Curious Huck  —  Mike Huckabee is now becoming a very divisive figure in the Republican party.  It's not his faith or his Merry Christmas commercial that many conservatives question (I certainly don't), but it's his record as governor and his stated positions on the war, foreign policy generally, taxes, spending, and illegal aliens.

A Moment of Idiocy, of Real Idiocy  —  The above title is the correct assessment of the new energy bill that President Bush just signed into law, less than 24 hrs after the House approved it by a 314-100 margin.  House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, speaking just prior to yesterday's vote …

Did Huckabee Have Gastric Bypass Surgery?  —  Zogby says that we're in the middle of a Huckaboom — they find that Mike Huckabee is within 1 point of Giuliani in the national polls.  Whether the Zogby poll is an outlier or not, Huckabee's surge over the past two months has been remarkable …

Sondra K-Grande Conservative Blogress Diva 2008  —  When we launched the Grande Conservative Blogress Diva contest this year, we expected to have a number of blogresses nominated and seconded as we did.  So, we assumed a run-off would be necessary.  —  What we did not anticipate was the number of glitches in this year's competition.

Official: Justice Dept. slowed probe into phone jamming  —  WASHINGTON — The Justice Department delayed prosecuting a key Republican official for jamming the phones of New Hampshire Democrats until after the 2004 election, protecting top GOP officials from the scandal until the voting was over.

Video: Hillary's unintentionally revealing Christmas ad  —  My jaw dropped when I watched this one the first time.  Hillary's Christmas ad says nothing at all about Christmas.  The gifts make the connection, of course, but check out what the gifts are: universal health care, bring the troops home, etc.

Huckabee Iowa Manager: ‘War on Terror a Theological War’  —  Mike Huckabee might want to “revise and extend” the remarks of his Iowa campaign manager.  Appearing on this evening's Tucker on MSNBC, Bob Vander Plaats stated that “we're fighting a radical religion in Islam” and that “the war on terror is a theological war.”