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On the Road: Goodbye New Hampshire

Perry is already framing his trip to South Carolina as his "Alamo"
Photo by Ben Philpott for KUT News
Perry is already framing his trip to South Carolina as his "Alamo"

Well, that's two states down, at least one more to go.

I'm flying out of Manchester today for the final time. I'll join up with Governor Rick Perry, who is already campaigning in South Carolina. His dismissal of the fist primary state was obvious over the weekend. After both of the two weekend debates here, there were just a couple of reporters waiting to talk with Perry surrogates in the debate "Spin Room."

Now, part of that is because Perry is polling dead last in New Hampshire. The higher you are in the polls the more you are surrounded by the media. But I also know of at least three news organizations that sent reporters straight from Iowa to South Carolina (with a layover in Austin, as reportersinitially expected a campaign ending speech there last week).

KUT had already purchased my plane tickets to New Hampshire. I already had a rental car and hotel waiting. And Perry was going to participate in two debates here, so I came up to cover those.

One interesting note about how NPR is ramping up it's coverage: The "mother ship" had an election night headquarters in Iowa and brought 17 people to the Saturday night debate in Manchester. So even if Governor Perry drops out, KUT and NPR will have you covered throughout the process.

And now on to South Carolina.

Ben Philpott is the Managing Editor for KUT. Got a tip? Email him at bphilpott@kut.org. Follow him on Twitter @BenPhilpottKUT.
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