Mason-Dixon polls the early states: Clinton is in trouble, Huckabee is on fire

Mason Dixon just released polls from the early states for both the Democratic and Republican race. The bottom line: Huckabee has become a front-runner, and Clinton is in trouble.

Republicans

• In Iowa, it's all Mike Huckabee: He comes in at 32%, followed by Romney's 20%. Thompson gets 11%, McCain 7% and Giuliani only 5%!
• In New Hampshire, Romney maintains a fragile lead with 25%, followed by Giuliani at 17%, McCain at 16% and Huckabee at 11%.
• And in South Carolina, it's Huckabee with 20%, followed by Giuliani at 17%, Romney at 15%, Thompson at 14% and McCain at 10%.

Huckabee now has the lead in 2 out of 3 early states. Combine this with the lead he had in Michigan yesterday and he is truly on fire. An Iowa victory is looking pretty much assured at this point, though it will be interesting to see if the deluge of negative stories and attacks that is now aimed at him will hurt him or not.

New Hampshire could very well be the test for Giuliani and Romney now. It is the only state where no Huckabee surge is being recorded, which means that it would be a free for all between Giuliani, Romney and McCain (and probably Huckabee) if he were to win Iowa. There probably is only room for one of these three candidates to battle Huckabee at this point, so it's make it or break it in the Granite State for the three Republicans who were once mighty frontrunners.

Democrats

• In Iowa, Clinton gets 27% to Obama's 25% and Edwards's 21%. Richardson stays at 9%.When asked their second-choice, 30% pick Obama, 29% Clinton and 27% Edwards -- which is actually much-better than usual for Hillary.
• In New Hampshire, Clinton gets 30% to Obama's 27%. Edwards is at 10%. This is her smallest lead in months.
• In South Carolina, Clinton has fallen to 28% followed by Obama at 25% and Edwards is much more competitive than usual, at 18%.

No question about it, the Clinton campaign is in trouble. She has led by double digits in all three states, and by huge margins in both New Hampshire and South Carolina. Now, she is way within the margin of error in all three, between 2% and 3%. This is a catastrophic showing, and it appears obvious that she could very well stumble and lose all three of these states to Obama if he manages to win Iowa. Given that Obama is very well prepared and flooded with cash, I wonder how much Clinton would be able to do if Barack sweeped the early states -- and would her likely wins in Michigan and Florida stop the tide?

One hope she has in Iowa at the moment: The second choice numbers are much better than what we're used to seeing, and they remind us of the Zogby numbers out earlier in the week. If these are true, Clinton might actually be in better shape than anticipated: For Obama and Edwards voters surely pick the other candidate as their second-choice, which is pretty much useless since both are likely to be viable most places. If Clinton manages to stay competitive with them on the second choice question, it means she gets a large percentage of the Biden, Richardson and Dodd second-choice, and it is among those voters that the fight for the win is likely going to be waged.