as these holidays wind down. the president yial campaign sean is heating up. one week from tomorrow, the iowa caucuses will mark the first formal votes in the 2012 race. right now, it s too close to call, statistically speaking. according to a poll from the american research group, ron paul, mitt romney, and newt gingrich are locked in a three-way statistical tie. you can see it there. 21, 20, 19% apiece. paul steinhauser is in des moines with more on this three-way battle. and no clear front-runner at least for iowa, paul. reporter: no clear front-runner. and that poll you just showed from arg came out on friday. the most receipt polling we have of people likely to take part in that caucus on january 30. it also indicates with just a week to go 1-10 still say they haven t made up their minds. and a sizeable amount are saying, i m backing this candidate or that candidate, but i may change my mind. three-way traffic jam, i guess you could say, for the top spot. ron paul, tho
$4.2 billion. this is our small effort to stand behind them when they need us most. reporter: earlier, president obama received a hero s welcome just before repealing the 17-year-old don t ask, don t tell policy, allowing homosexuals to serve openly in the military. it was just, you know, surreal. is this really happening? i mean, it was history. and we ve been waiting for this for such a long time. reporter: the president has left for christmas vacation in his home state of hawaii where he will meet up with the first lady and their two daughters. rob and vinita? as we ve been talking about all morning, the weather outside is frightful. in one southern california hospital the newborns were truly delightful. not to mention they came wrapped in their own christmas stockings. look at that, that s adorable. it s become an annual tradition at the millers children s hospital in long beach, california. it almost makes the crying not annoying. almost.
wandering around the schoolyard, local residents calling police after spotting the creature as it hobbles around and we re told sea lions offer pray for more comfortable home in search of food. one rescuer saying this isn t the first time this encountered a roaming sea lion. and throughout the marine mammals set for volunteers calving the animals in a net and off to the vets office. if she checks out they ll release her back to the wild. wisconsin, a wet and wild water ski show in madison. members of the water ski team bundling up and showing off to raise money for the american family children s hospital. and as you can see, the weather outside, was frightful, but the talented skiers say they re grateful. and the perfect timing and the snowstorm and adds a lot of ambiance to it and we re
acorn. how much money is acorn going to get in the new budget? we ll tell you. bill: how much snow are we going to get, huh? the ice is out there, the rain is out there, the snows are coming. martha: it s february. bill: we got an e-mail yesterday saying look out. j.d. has the forecast coming up today. oh, the weather outside is frightful, but the fire is delightful and since we ve no place to go let it snow, let it snow, let it snow #ñ#ñ#ñ#ñññññññññr
as much as 6 inches of snow is expected in chicago for christmas eve. adding the windy city to the list of those expecting a white christmas this year. but getting where you are going the day before by air or road may prove slow-going. kurt gregory, nbc news. speaking of the weather outside, let s go right to meteorologist, dominica davis to see how the forecast is shaping up for this christmas eve. please tell us good news. the good news is, this is the last day of all this terrible weather. we can finally stop talking about it. i am going to start with those storm reports. yesterday, severe weather was concentrated down from louisiana to georgia. that s where all our storm reports came in. they were over 14 reports of tornadoes that did span from louisiana over to georgia. a lot of damage with that wind and hail reports. that s over today. the threat is diminishing. we have a tornado threat in