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Tom notes that Huckabee's victory raises some serious questions for the Republican establishment:
First, will Huckabee fade as a phenomenon by next week, as iconoclastic New Hampshire voters send the sort of stick-in-the-eye message to Iowans that they did in 1980, 1988 and 2004? If that happens, the contest could shift to a battle between a still well-funded Romney and a surging McCain, whose most famous win came against George W. Bush in the Granite State in 2008. Or is Huckabee a political phenomenon with a broader appeal whose win here will catapult him to the sort of primaries run that John Kerry used four years ago after his much narrower Iowa victory to capture the nomination?Beyond the horse-race implications, what are the intra-party effects of Huckabee's solid win? Does Huckabee become a too difficult to pass over option for the vice presidential nod should he not win the nomination outright? Has he permanently ruined Romney's presidential bid, despite the fact that the next contest is in Romney's home region? And given that McCain fell flat despite so much late attention, finishing slightly behind (13.2 percent) Sen. Fred Thompson and his lackluster campaign (13.4 percent), did Huckabee manage to dampen McCain's effort to revive his straight-talking shtick?Read his entire article (and comment) here.--The Editors