It's January, so It Must be Time to Start Blogging. I will be picking up the blog again starting today, so check back every couple of days for a new nugget or two. There are two items I wanted to pass along today.

Jeff van Wychen and John Fitzgerald have put together a nice piece on the Minnesota 2020 website. You may recall the Minnesota 2020's founder and chair Matt Entenza spoke at our December meeting. This new piece shows how property taxes are rising for school districts while revenue is actually flat or declining. The article can be found at: http://www.mn2020.org/index.asp?Type=B_BASIC&SEC=%7BA9AE8CC7-63B1-4678-BD1C-74FA8530D50C%7D&DE=

The other item I want to include is a very good catch-all reference page for all of you political junkies out there. The site is Real Clear Politics and it's chock-full of polls and political articles. It can be found at: http://www.realclearpolitics.com/.

As for New Hampshire (I know you are all just dying to know what I think), it's clear that organization counts for something and that the Clinton campaign organization is nothing to sneeze at. The hammering she took in the press leading up to New Hampshire also probably helped her. And the guys at her rally chanting "Iron my shirts!" may well have ignited some support for her in a backhanded sense.

On the "R" side of the ticket, McCain's performance was certainly impressive and it will be interesting to see if the boost he received in New Hampshire translates to success in Michigan and South Carolina. It's important to remember that Romney has spent a ton of money and a lot of it has gone into building a national presence with organizational structures in each state. Unless a tidal wave of McCain or Huckabee support washes out that structure, Romney can probably stay in the race longer than some now believe. Romney needs a win sooner or later, but if he keeps coming in second, he's going to be piling up delegates. That may not get him the nomination, but it may go a long way toward determining who does.