An Eye on Iowa: Huckabee leads Romney 28-25%

A Major shake-up in the GOP field is underway... Mitt Romney, who has been the clear favorite in Iowa since the beginning of the summer, has now fallen to second place based on the latest Rasmussen poll in that state.

Iowa Caucus
Mike Huckabee - 28%
Mitt Romney - 25%
Rudy Giuliani - 12%
Fred Thompson - 11%
Ron Paul - 5%
John McCain - 4%
Tom Tancredo - 4%
Duncan Hunter - 1%

This clearly spells trouble for Mitt Romney's campaign! Mitt has spent over $10 Million in the early voting states on advertisement, where Huckabee has spent fractions of that. And furthermore, this is an embarassing blow to Romney's national challenge to GOP front-runner Rudy Giuliani. This surely takes the pressure of of the Rudy campaing from Romney, and will likely focus some of Romney's mud at the Huckabee campaign. Romney has already been taking stabs at Mike Huckabee over his fiscal record while Governor of Arkansas... however, Mike Huckabee seems to have a friend in Dick Morris, who is helping Mike maintain his Teflon Sports Coat.

One deeper issue is that the Super Tuesday states still show Rudy as the clear leader... but the surprising second place finisher in the most recent Rasmussen poll is Mike Huckabee.

So as the Primary / Caucus season fast approaches, there are some questions that are beginning to rise:

1. Has Romney burned out, despite his Hugh Hewitt endorsement and constant free press?
2. Does Rudy have to fear Mike Huckabee more than Mitt, McCain, and Fred?
3. If Mike Huckabee wins Iowa in January, does that put the final nail in Mitt Romney's coffin?
4. What ever happened to Fred Thompson?
5. Does this kind of polling spell a major shake-up for the GOP candidates?
6. And, If Mike Huckabee beats Rudy for the nomination, can he win the General Election?

I will leave the discussion up to you all... but I will comment on question 6. The answer is YES. If you look at the states that Bush won in 2004, Huckabee will easily win all those same states. There will be few swing states, especially against a polarizing Democratic candidate like Hillary Clinton.

Things just officially got exciting in the GOP field! Let's see if it gets mention in the CNN / YouTube debates tonight!