A great example of McCain's up and down ride is the Rasmussen poll in South Carolina.  Before New Hampshire, with Mike Huckabee riding high on his Iowa victory, McCain polled at 21%, 7 points behind Huckabee.  After McCain won in New Hampshire, he vaulted past Huckabee into the lead 28% to 19%.  And now a poll taken yesterday by Rasmussen shows McCain dropping back into a tie with Huckabee.  Going forward, I don't foresee anything to bolster McCain's numbers.  Instead, I believe we'll see his support continue to erode over the next 48 hours.

Now back to Romney.  I opined in an update to my previous post that Romney would springboard into a two-man race with Huckabee as a result of his victory in Michigan.  So far, that doesn't appear to be happening.  The reason has to do with Fred Thompson's last stand.  The southern gentleman is making an all out push to score a victory in South Carolina, and his efforts are a threat to Romney's support more than any other GOP contender.  The end result is that neither man is seeing a marked increase in the polls.  Romney's numbers appear to be pretty static - no bounce at all - while Thompson may be seeing just a slight up tick.

So what are we to conclude about South Carolina two days before the votes are cast?  Huckabee seems to have the upper hand, and I see him continuing to draw support away from McCain.  Romney and Thompson are battling each other - in my mind for second.  It is entirely possible for McCain to fall to fourth before all the votes are counted on Saturday evening.

I'll post another update on the South Carolina race tomorrow and then my official predictions late tomorrow night or early Saturday morning.  As earlier, there'll be a prediction roundup from around the blogosphere as well.  So, email me those predictions!