[...] The reason this is a firewall state for him, is it is where he should win, he's spent the time necessary to win (10 straight days in the state) and, most importantly, it is a closed primary state. That means only Republicans will be voting for their field for the first time. If he can't pull a win or place under those conditions, it is reasonable to conclude that it isn't going to happen in the rest of the South.

If Thompson should fail to garner the votes necessary to take first or second, and drops out of the race, the postmortem will be interesting. He is, by far, the most conservative of the group. In fact, if you look at some Pew Research data, those he's running against are, for the most part moderates with Huckabee essentially being a re-run of George W. Bush and the rest being to the left of Huckabee. [...]

Now There's Evidence of a Fred Surge

Well, after yesterday's brouhaha over whether Thompson was really surging ... American Research Group does show what I would all a real surge, rising from 13 percent in the poll taken January 15-16 to 21 percent in the poll taken January 17-18.

Among Republicans, he ties McCain with 22 percent. McCain is way ahead in independents.

A finish like that - behind McCain with 26 percent and Huckabee with 36 percent, but beating Romney by 9, would be plenty reason to stay in the race.