CNN Poll: Romney on top, Gingrich fading & Santorum rising in Iowa  —  Des Moines, Iowa (CNN) - Did Newt Gingrich peak too early?  —  A new survey of people likely to attend Iowa's Republican caucuses indicates that the former House speaker's support in the Hawkeye State is plunging.

Gingrich: Campaign worker's signature fraud cost slot on Virginia ballot  —  Algona, Iowa (CNN) - Newt Gingrich cited fraud Wednesday as the reason he didn't get on the Virginia primary ballot.  —  Last week his campaign acknowledged they used paid volunteers to scramble …

What We Think About When We Think About the Court  —  Wherever I go these days, someone is bound to ask me how I think the Supreme Court will rule in the challenge to the Affordable Care Act, set for argument over three days during the last week in March.  My response, that I expect the court …

Chavez: U.S. May Be Behind Leaders' Cancer  —  Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez hinted that the U.S. may be behind a “very strange” bout of cancer affecting several leaders aligned with him in South America.  —  Chavez, speaking a day after Argentine President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner …

Is the Obama Boomlet Over?  —  Over the last week or so, there has been a lot of news coverage of Barack Obama's comeback in the polls.  I noted his modest bounce here, and Scott Rasmussen wrote us to say that he thought Obama's rise was due to increasing optimism about the economy.

Repo Men  —  If you're making money on the Wall Street scale — which is nothing like your boring, middle-management in the Fortune 500, Hamptons-and-Mercedes, barely-a-1 percenter type money — then you can buy basically anything.  When real-estate investor Robert Rosania put part …

Priests brawl in Bethlehem's Church of the Nativity  —  Greek Orthodox and Armenian priests and monks came to blows during preparations for Orthodox Christmas celebrations  —  Scuffles have broken out between rival groups of Greek Orthodox and Armenian clerics in a turf war at Bethlehem's Church of the Nativity.

Tarzan co-star Cheetah dies at Palm Harbor sanctuary  —  Cheetah the chimpanzee, who acted in classic Tarzan movies in the early 1930s, died of kidney failure Saturday at Suncoast Primate Sanctuary in Palm Harbor, a sanctuary spokeswoman said.  —  Cheetah was roughly 80 years old …

Jon Swift Memorial Roundup 2011  —  Welcome to a tradition started by the much missed Jon Swift/Al Weisel.  He left behind some excellent satire, but was also a nice guy and a strong supporter of small blogs.  As Lance Mannion puts it: … Here's his 2007 and 2008 editions.  Last year's revival is here.

The Times E-Mails Millions by Mistake to Say Subscriptions Were Canceled  —  Updated The New York Times said it accidentally sent e-mails on Wednesday to more than eight million people who had shared their information with the company, erroneously informing them they had canceled home delivery of the newspaper.

TPM2012  —  Death Penalty For Gays: Ron Paul Courts The Religious Fringe In Iowa  —  Ron Paul has faced a torrent of criticism in recent weeks over newsletters printed in his name during the 1980s and 1990s which contained racist, anti-semitic, and homophobic content.

What Moves Republican Crowds in Iowa  —  DES MOINES — The Republican candidates for president are doing a lot of talking in the last week before voting begins.  —  But spending a day observing how the crowds react to the candidates can be just as instructive.

Iowa GOP explains moving vote tabulation away from HQ  —  Iowa GOP chair Matt Strawn was largely mum when I asked yesterday about a tip I got that the state party was moving the vote-tabulation away from their headquarters to an “undisclosed location.”  —  But after the Iowa GOP HQ …

Ranks of Young Paul Volunteers Willingly Clean Up for the Cause  —  DES MOINES — Ron Paul's college-aged volunteer army — a core of the powerful ground organization that is the envy of rivals — is descending on Iowa from around the nation to coax people to the state's Republican caucuses …