In her story today, Patricia Lopez describes how the presidential campaign in Iowa spills over the border into southern Minnesota. That includes a blizzard of ads landing in Minnesotan’s living rooms.

Here’s a sample of the ads that the leading candidates are airing in Iowa. Take a look at them and then weigh in with your reactions.

Here’s Obama’s ad on education, titled “Chances I Had.”

Here is John Edwards’s “20 Generations” ad, in which he seeks to establish himself as a spirited fighter against greed and corruption, in behalf of the little guy.

Here are two Clinton ads. This one is called “New Beginning.”

And this one features Retired Gen. Wesley Clark.

On the Republican side, Mitt Romney and Mike Huckabee are battling it out — in the polls and on the airwaves.

Here’s Mitt Romney’s ad attacking Huckabee on immigration.

And here’s another Romney ad called “Not Politically Correct,” in which he attempts to reassure conservatives on some key issues.

Here’s Huckabee talking about securing the borders.

And here’s the ad featuring actor Chuck Norris that no doubt helped people warm up to Huckabee.

What do you think about these ads?

The GOP debate this week produced lots of fireworks, so here’s a look at follow-up stories and websites that try to sort out the facts behind the charges.

At PolitiFact.com, the Truth-O-Meter and the Attack File concludes:
Rudy Giuliani’s claim that Mitt Romney failed to take action against sanctuary cities: Mostly true.
Mitt Romney’s claim that Giuliani welcomed illegal immigrants: True.
Mike Huckabee’s explanation about school benefits for children of illegal immigants: Barely true.
Mitt Romney (aka Bill Buckner) muffed an easy grounder: He got a key Red Sox stat wrong.
Mitt Romney’s stat on out-of-wedlock African-American births: True.
Ron Paul’s claim on receiving campaign donations from military members: True.
John McCain’s claim on saving taxpayers $2 billion: True.

Here’s an AP story that examines whether New York was a sanctuary city under Guiliani. It makes a compelling case that NYC followed the same policies toward illegal immigrants as do cities that proudly proclaim themselves as sanctuary cities. In NYC, the policy was put in place long before Giuliani became mayor, but he vigorously protected the policy.

Giuliani took a swipe at Romney, saying he had a “sanctuary mansion” because illegal immigrants worked at the former governor’s home in Massachusetts. Here’s the original Boston Globe story, which was published nearly a year ago.

This first AP story and this second AP story explore whether Rudy Giuliani hid the costs of police protection for him while he had extramarital trysts with his now-wife, Judity Nathan.

Here’s the original Politico.com report, and here’s Politico’s next-day follow-up.

Here’s Guiliani explaining away the charge, on CBS news. (Be warned: 30-second ad precedes the report.)

Who do you think was “more truthful” and who was “less truthful” in the debate?

Just a few months ago, former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee shared the anonymity of the handful of other back-of-the-pack Republican presidential candidates. In recent weeks, he’s registered a stunning climb in the polls.

Mike Huckabee

And after Wednesday night’s You Tube/CNN debate, he’s bound to get another huge boost — perhaps enough to propel him to victory in Iowa.

He had what appears, at least in the immediate aftermath, to have been a breakthrough performance. He was articulate, funny, homespun and perhaps more than any other candidate he exuded a confidence and sense of comfort in who he is and what he believes. (John McCain and Fred Thompson came close behind.)

Perhaps Huckabee struggled a bit to explain his support for scholarships for children of illegal aliens. But after that he scored on virtually every question. He was direct and unapologetic and registered high on the likeability scale.

Mitt Romney may have fared the worst. He’s already suspect among many Republicans for his evolution on key issues. And his performance could not have helped any in allaying those concerns. He stumbled, stammered and didn’t seem to know what he believed on some key issues, and at times his first instinct seemed to be to duck and weave.

Some other observations:

I’ll take the citizen-submitted video format and Anderson Cooper over Wolf Blitzer and Tim Russert any day.

Even so, while the questions were generally good, this batch of videos wasn’t as creative or surprising as the batch used in the Democratic debate.

I was surprised they didn’t use Minnesota’s Billiam the Snowman, given that this debate almost didn’t happen because of opposition to Billiam.

I was disappointed that they didn’t use a Red State Update video question, as they did in the Democratic debate. Those guys are hilarious. To see their work, go to their website here.

But this video, I thought, did stand out.

So what did you think of the debate? Do you think Huckabee will get the biggest bounce? And what did you think of Thompson submitting an attack ad for his own video? What else caught your attention?

If you can’t be in Iowa, here’s the next best thing — a number of videos that give you a flavor of the campaign as it starts the homestretch run to the Jan. 3 caucuses.

This Obama campaign video shows what activists actually do — in this case, preparing for the Harkin Steak Fry, where Obama was speaking. There’s drums, cheerleaders — and everyone is “fired up, ready to go.”

In debates, John Edwards talks about the fundamentally corrupt system in Washington. That’s the subject of this speech, but it’s delivered with the kind of passion that’s hard to convey during a debate, when you’re standing behind a podium and Wolf Blizter is shouting at you: “Yes or no.”

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton’s campaign had some egg on its face recently, when it was disclosed that a campaign staffer planted a question — during a Clinton appearance — with an all-too-willing college student. I can’t embed the video here, but here are a couple of links to CNN videos. First, here’s the question and Clinton’s answer. And here’s an interview with the Grinnell College student who explains how it all happened.

This video of former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee isn’t quite as lively and exciting as the Obama video. But just because his supporters aren’t marching and shouting, it doesn’t mean they’re any less enthusiastic and committed to their candidate. It’s people like Bob Anderson who are behind the recent Huckabee surge in Iowa.

Here’s Rudy Giuliani (”the only Republican with an office east of Des Moines”) speaking at the University of Iowa.

Rep. Tom Tancredo last week started running a hard-edged new ad about immigration and terrorism. As he explains at the start, “I’m Tom Tancredo, and I approved this message because someone needs to say it.”

And, for old time’s sake, here’s The Scream — Howard Dean’s overly enthusiastic speech to supporters after his third-place finish in Iowa in 2004.

In less than two months, voters will begin weeding out the presidential candidates, starting with the Iowa caucuses on Jan. 3 and New Hampshire’s still-to-be-scheduled primary.

So here’s a round-up of the latest news from those two key states, starting with Iowa.

This past weekend was a big one for Democrats, with 9,000 activists attending the party’s annual fundraising event — the Jefferson Jackson Dinner — in Des Moines. At the dinner, John Edwards delivered some of the sharpest rhetoric of the night, according to this AP story.

Here’s the Des Moines Register’s account, along with excerpts of the speeches given by the six candidates who attended the dinner.

Mike Huckabee has made big gains in Iowa

The most recent polls show Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton with a very narrow lead over Sen. Barack Obama and former Sen. John Edwards. The University of Iowa’s Hawkeye Poll surveyed likely caucus-goers Oct. 17-24, and it found that Clinton had 29 percent support, while Obama had 27 percent and Edwards had 20 percent. That put all of them within the poll’s margin of sampling error of plus or minus 5.5 percent. A Zogby poll taken Nov. 6 had Clinton at 28, Obama at 25, and Edwards at 21. In both polls, New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson was a long way back, in single digits.

On the Republican side, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney holds a comfortable lead, but former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee is showing signs of surging. The Hawkeye Poll had Romney at 36 percent, and former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani and Huckabee both at about 13 percent, followed by former Sen. Fred Thompson at 11 percent. Zogby found similar results: Romeny at 31, Huckabee at 15, Giuliani at 11 and Thompson at 10.

On Friday, the New York Times had a front-page story that explored this surge by Huckabee. The story said that “there is a new sense of possiblity in the Huckabee campaign. It has been fueled in large part by evangelicals, including a politically active home-schooling population, dissatisfied with his better-financed competitors.”

On the Democratic side, Sen. Joe Biden may be trailing in the polls, but he can boast of having earned the first Iowa newspaper endorsement. Here’s the Storm Lake Times editorial from Oct. 20.

In New Hampshire, Romney again holds a significant lead, according to a Boston Globe poll taken Nov. 2-7. It had Romney at 32, Giuliani at 20, Sen. John McCain at 17, and Huckabee at 5. A Marist Poll taken at about the same time found similar numbers.

Clearly, the Huckabee surge hasn’t spread to New Hampshire, but if he beats expectations in Iowa, that could translate into an immediate boost in New Hampshire.

In the Democratic race, Clinton enjoys a larger lead over Obama than she does in Iowa. The Globe had Clinton at 35 and Obama at 21, with Edwards at 15 and Richardson at 10. The Marist Poll had it Clinton 38, Obama 26, Edwards 14 and Richardson at 6.

Meanwhile, it’s still uncertain when New Hampshire voters will go to the polls. Officials there are waiting to see if Michigan’s attempt to jump up in the schedule to Jan. 15 succeeds. If it does, then New Hampshire almost certainly would go before Michigan, possibly holding its primary in December.