Tag Team: [Dan Tuohy, New Hampshire Union Leader]: “The double shot of pop culture [Oprah] and politics [Obama] at the Verizon Wireless Arena combined to produce one of the largest campaign events in the history of the New Hampshire Presidential Primary.”
The French Candidate: [Eli Saslow, The Washington Post]: “The mind-set that now shapes Romney's candidacy for the Republican presidential nomination first crystallized after that fateful drive to the South of France: One does not merely strive for leadership; he is called to it through prayer and circumstance”
Bringing Home the Bacon: [Tom Hamburger and Dan Morain, Los Angeles Times]: “Since taking office in 2001, Clinton has delivered $500 million worth of earmarks that have specifically benefited 59 corporations. … [C]linton does significantly more earmarking than most others with her relatively low level of seniority.”
Young Gun: [Michael Powell, The New York Times]: “There are three founding stones in the public career of Rudolph Giuliani: His performance during the terror attacks of 9/11; his image as a crime-fighting mayor of New York; and his nearly five-year tenure as United States attorney. It was in this earliest incarnation that Mr. Giuliani is most plainly seen in the rawness of his promise and drive.”
Pardon Me: [Andrew DeMillo, AP]: “As governor of Arkansas, Mike Huckabee had a hand in twice as many pardons and commutations as his three predecessors combined.”
--Ben Crair