memeorandum: House Democrats Demand GOP ‘Come Back From Vacation’ (ABCNEWS)

3:30 PM ET, January 6, 2012

Top Items:

South Carolina Primary: Romney 27%, Santorum 24%, Gingrich 18% — What a difference a caucus makes. Rick Santorum who two months ago had one percent (1%) support among likely South Carolina Republican Primary voters now is running a close second there with 24% of the vote.

Discussion: American Prospect, Hot Air, American Research Group, Guardian, LifeNews.com, Big Government, CatholicVote.org, Right Wing News, Outside the Beltway, The Hill, Campaign 2012, The Moderate Voice, GOP 12, FiveThirtyEight, Ballot Box, ABCNEWS, Wake up America and The PJ Tatler

Adam Sorensen / Swampland:

TIME/CNN/ORC Poll: Romney Storms Ahead in South Carolina — In another sign of the front-runner's growing strength. Mitt Romney has taken the lead in South Carolina, according to a TIME/CNN/ORC poll released Friday. — The poll, which surveyed likely primary voters on Wednesday and Thursday …

Discussion: Guardian, Hot Air, Washington Post, The Politico, Talking Points Memo and Outside the Beltway

Daniel Strauss / The Hill:

Gingrich: Romney should drop out if he doesn't win New Hampshire primary — Newt Gingrich said if Mitt Romney doesn't win the New Hampshire primary, he should drop out of the race. — “Look, this is one of his best states other than Utah and Massachusetts.

Discussion: CNN and The Politico

Gschwarzcnn / CNN:

CNN/Time Poll: Romney and Santorum soar in South Carolina — (CNN) - Mitt Romney's numbers in South Carolina are surging, and he now has a solid lead over his rivals for the Republican presidential nomination, according to a new survey of likely GOP primary voters in the Palmetto state.

Discussion: The Caucus and Business Insider

Rasmussen Reports:

New Hampshire: Romney 42%, Paul 18%, Santorum 13%, Huntsman 12% — Former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney is pulling away from the pack in New Hampshire as Tuesday's first-in-the-nation primary nears. His nearest rival now trails him by more than 20 points.

Discussion: Opinion L.A., CBS Boston, Eunomia, Big Government, Campaign 2012, Hot Air and GOP 12

Shushannah Walshe / ABCNEWS:

Pro-Santorum SuperPAC Buys Ad Time in South Carolina — ABC News has learned that a SuperPAC which supports Rick Santorum, the Red, White and Blue Fund, is going up with TV ads in South Carolina. This will be the first time the SuperPAC is on the air in the “First-in-the-South” state.

Discussion: GOP 12

Jonathan Easley / Ballot Box:
Poll shows Romney pulling away in SC, with Santorum in second

Discussion: CNN

Wall Street Journal:
Romney Wins but Takes a Beating

Discussion: Eunomia and GOP 12

ABCNEWS: Gingrich on Romney Debating the President: ‘Obama is Going to Laugh at Him’

Charles Krauthammer / Washington Post:
A worthy challenger — After every other conservative alternative …

Discussion: The New Republic, GOP 12, The Other McCain, The Atlantic Wire, New York Magazine, Associated Press and THEROOT.COM

Mj Lee / The Politico: Newt: Obama will ‘laugh’ at Mitt

Gschwarzcnn / CNN:
Romney hits Obama's economic record despite improving jobs numbers

Discussion: The Politico

KCCI-TV:

Could Typo Rewrite Caucus History? — Caucus Vote Counter Says Romney Mistakenly Given 20 Votes — DES MOINES, Iowa — Caucus night was chaotic in many places, with hundreds of voters, candidates showing up and the throngs of media who followed. The world's eyes were on Iowa.

David Brooks / New York Times:

A New Social Agenda — I'm to Rick Santorum's left on most social issues, like same-sex marriage and abortion. I'm also put off by his Manichaean political rhetoric. He seems to imagine America's problems can best be described as the result of a culture war between the God-fearing conservatives and the narcissistic liberals.

Discussion: ABCNEWS, Crooks and Liars, The New Republic, The Daily Dish, No More Mister Nice Blog, The Hill, The Atlantic Online, The Mahablog, Connecting.the.Dots and driftglass

Shushannah Walshe / ABCNEWS:
Santorum Booed After Gay Marriage Exchange

Discussion: 2012 Decoded, The Caucus, Catholic Bandita, American Power, Hugh Hewitt's TownHall Blog, The Right Scoop and Patterico's Pontifications

Igor Volsky / ThinkProgress:
Santorum Booed Again For Saying Gays Aren't Entitled To Marriage Or Military Service

Discussion: The Reaction and Towleroad News #gay

Michael D. Shear / The Caucus:
Santorum Has Testy Exchange on Same-Sex Marriage

Discussion: FiveThirtyEight, Daily Kos, American Power, M.JOSEPH SHEPPARD'S …, Althouse and ThinkProgress

Michael Gerson / Washington Post:
Rick Santorum and the return of compassionate conservatism

Discussion: American Prospect, Cato @ Liberty, New York Times, Democracy in America and CatholicVote.org

Shaila Dewan / New York Times:

U.S. Adds 200,000 Jobs; Unemployment Rate at 8.5% — The United States added a robust 200,000 new jobs last month, the Labor Department said Friday, in a sign that the long-awaited economic recovery has finally built up a head of steam. — The nation's unemployment rate fell to 8.5 percent in December …

Discussion: The Moderate Voice, Calculated Risk, Hot Air, White House.gov Blog, The Hill, Wall Street Journal, Reuters, Economix, Felix Salmon, Firedoglake, Taylor Marsh, Campaign 2012, News Desk and Gothamist

Ezra Klein / Washington Post:
A good jobs report — and a good year

Discussion: The Moderate Voice, American Prospect and New York Times

Jeff Cox / CNBC:
Unemployment Falls to 8.5%; 200,000 New Jobs Created

Discussion: Real Time Economics, Calculated Risk, Outside the Beltway, Brookings Institute, Washington Post, Washington Monthly, The Gateway Pundit and The Political Carnival

Tim Mullaney / USA Today:
Dec. unemployment rate lowest in nearly 3 years

Discussion: Weasel Zippers and Marathon Pundit

Julia Preston / New York Times:

Path to Green Card for Illegal Immigrant Family Members of Americans — Obama administration officials announced on Friday that they will propose a fix to a notorious snag in immigration law that will spare hundreds of thousands of American citizens from prolonged separations from immigrant spouses and children.

Discussion: ThinkProgress, Los Angeles Times, Time, 24Ahead, The Politico, Law Blog, Daily Kos, Weasel Zippers, Colorlines, Hullabaloo and Feministing

Steve Benen / Washington Monthly:
Obama to make major green-card reform

Discussion: The Political Carnival, Wonkette and Jammie Wearing Fools

Brad Cooper / Kansas City Star:

Legislator apologizes for ‘YoMama’ email about first lady — Kansas legislator acknowledges forwarding email note mocking first lady's name, hair style. — Kansas House Speaker Mike O'Neal on Thursday apologized for an email that made fun of first lady Michelle Obama's hair style and mockingly called her “Mrs. YoMama.”

Discussion: The Hinterland Gazette and Washington Post

Scott Rothschild / The Lawrence Journal-World:
Speaker O'Neal apologizes for forwarding email that calls Michelle Obama “Mrs. YoMama”

Discussion: The Politico, Wonkette, ThinkProgress, The Raw Story and The Huffington Post

Amie Parnes / The Hill:

Obama takes victory lap — Two days after defying Republicans and appointing Richard Cordray to head the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, President Obama took a little time to gloat. — Making a victory lap of sorts at the independent agency, Obama cracked a joke …

Discussion: The Politico and Weasel Zippers

David Frum / FrumForum:

All Good Things... FrumForum launched itself almost exactly three years ago, on Inauguration Day 2009. Over the subsequent interval, our hundreds of contributors have reached more than 5 million individual readers. I like to think that together we have helped to move the national debate.

Discussion: driftglass

Cindy Adams / New York Post:

Short NBC gig for Chelsea? — Chelsea Clinton's much-trumpeted deal with NBC seems to be nearly done. Her contract is for only 90 days, and while she'll provide the network with two more stories, sources say it is not certain she'll immediately sign again.

Discussion: Jammie Wearing Fools, Business Insider and Althouse

Reuters:

Special report: Romney's steel skeleton in the Bain closet — (Reuters) - It was funny at first. — The young men in business suits, gingerly picking their way among the millwrights, machinists and pipefitters at Kansas City's Worldwide Grinding Systems steel mill.

Discussion: Washington Monthly, ThinkProgress, rubber hose and Ricochet Conversations Feed

Jason Mattera / Human Events:

Rubio in letter to Obama: You are turning America into a ‘deadbeat nation’ — In a scathing letter sent to Barack Obama this morning, Senator Marco Rubio said that under the President's first term in office, “more and more people have come to believe that America is becoming a deadbeat nation.”

Discussion: The Radio Patriot and Campaign 2012