The nomination…in eight minutes…

As now-Republican nominee John McCain heads back to New Hampshire, we turn back the clock to just 2 months ago, when Senator McCain’s triumph over his opponents was far from assured. From DoubleSpeak’s coverage of the New Hampshire Primary for the Huffington Post.

Originally posted on Off The Bus.

Wow! I just received an email in my inbox from Tagg Romney, Mitt Romney’s son, alerting me to a new video that I must check out of the Romney clan from this past summer living it up in beautiful Wolfeboro, New Hampshire. In the video, Mitt is celebrating a “day off” with the Romney’s. In the flick, he is seen mowing the lawn, surfing the interwebs, cooking s’mores, lighting fireworks and most of all, letting his hair down and taking his shirt off.

I worked on the 2002 race up in Massachusetts and I’ve seen this play before. Days before the election, the Romney camp released an ad on television showing Mitt gallivanting around topless, playing with his sons and his grandkids . This television ad was widely credited as being one of the reasons he was able to beat out Shanon O’Brien for the Governor’s seat that year.

Now, six years later, Mitt is running again and while the office he’s seeking has changed, the tactics have not. As Michiganders head to the polls today to decide Mitt Romney’s fate, the question remains: are voters in 2008 looking for tried and tested or are they willing to take the best and the buffest?

We ran into Bob Novak last week in New Hampshire and he made it very clear that he didn’t want to answer our questions. Check out the video.

If you enjoyed our video yesterday on Ron Paul and his New Hampshire campaign, give a listen to the extended version:

As always, you can check out our videos on YouTube, photos on Flickr, and our commentary and analysis on the Huffington Post.

In an interview with DoubleSpeak, Barack Obama’s Chief Strategist David Axelrod responded to Obama’s Iowa caucus victory. During this interview at the Senator’s first campaign event in the state of New Hampshire, Axelrod said that attacks on Obama are to be expected from his rivals over the next few days.

Rough transcript after the jump.

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Cross-posted at Huffington Post:

Since Iowa’s caucuses on Thursday there has been substantial focus on young voter turnout and its impact on election 2008. Now, the leading candidates have left the Hawkeye state and are taking their messages to New Hampshire voters, each hoping that their variation on the “change” theme will make them more appealing.

We packed our van and set-off to explore how young voters feel about change here in New Hampshire and which candidate will benefit most from this energy. There was no lack of excitement.

Photo by Cameron Hickey

We began the day with Barack Obama’s landing at the Portsmouth airport bright and early and ended as the sun set at New England College with Mike Huckabee.

Photo by Joshua Skaroff

We are preparing for tonight’s ABC/Facebook debate from Manchester, NH. We’ll be at the venue early and inside the spin room for post-debate reaction. Look for a photo wire throughout the evening as well as audio and video from the debate site.

Over eggs and toast this morning, team DoubleSpeak decided to dedicate our day to covering Ron Paul. Given the attention that is on Iowa today and the reality that this campaign will likely be flip-turned-upside-down overnight after the caucus, we ventured off to wade gingerly into Ron Paul’s New Hampshire revolution.

Whoever said the revolution will not be televised did not know DoubleSpeak and Off The Bus.

To say that we found anything near conventional would be completely false. The campaign looks nothing like operations we’ve been around in the past. A bearded ukulele player greeted us at the front door as scores of volunteers- many seemingly from out of state- prepared for one of their visibility “marches” back and forth to the New Hampshire statehouse which is a couple blocks away. The march was led by a gentlemen dressed in a revolutionary war uniform beating a drum as his flock chanted. But, this isn’t just a campaign…it’s a revolution. Revolutions need drummers…right?

As has been reported by The Huffington Post - Fox News is not allowing Rep. Paul to participate in the January 6th forum here in New Hampshire. We have found that this story has gotten significant legs here in the state and our read is that should Paul exceed expectations during tonight’s caucuses, pressure will mount for Fox to flip-flop and extend an invitation.

Tonight we are going to hop around Manchester, NH to various caucus watch parties. We wait in anticipation, along with all of you, to see how Iowa moves. We’ll be posting real-time pictures of our stops.

Tomorrow morning it’s up at 5:30 AM. We’ll start with an Edwards rally then off to see Obama, McCain and Clinton.

Stay tuned.

Update: Campaign officials have confirmed to us that the Paul campaign is planning a counter-event on Sunday night and that details would be released shortly.

It’s often said that elections aren’t a marathon, they’re a sprint. Well in our case, it’s starting to feel like we’re in the midst of a week long sprint.

We’ve driven up the east coast, we’ve managed to find our motel in the deep snows of New Hampshire, and now we’re packed into our room working on the website, writing and recording some audio, and as I write this Cameron is putting down the audio for our first video piece.

None of us really know what this project will yield both in terms of content and the mark that we will leave on this all important race. What we do know is we’re going to have fun.

Check back with us tomorrow morning for a look at today’s trip. We’ll also be in Manchester getting folks’ thoughts on caucus as it happens.