(Image source: Wikimedia Commons)

BY CHRISTINA HARTMAN

Despite its pretty spotty record of picking presidential nominees -- this week -- it’s all eyes on Iowa.

And a lot of those eyes -- are on one guy.

KPTV: “Romney has gone on the offensive in the final days of his campaign.”

CBS: “Mitt Romney has been late to the game here in Iowa.”

ABC: “The campaign has been going after Mitt Romney.”

And CNN’s almost ready to call it.

“CNN's checked with Iowa’s GOP insiders. They are picking Mitt Romney to win the state’s caucuses.”

Up until now -- Former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney has largely played it cool in Iowa. He placed second there in 2008 despite spending a nice chunk of change. This time around -- the National Journal reports -- he took a more wait-and-see approach.

“...Romney kept his distance for months... But as his more conservative rivals fell flat, one after the other, Romney ratcheted up his number of appearances and his advertising.”

A panel on MSNBC’s Morning Joe takes it further. TIME’s Mark Halperin going so far as to say -- if Romney wins Tuesday -- well -- it’s lights out for everyone else.

SCARBOROUGH: “Do you think it's over if Mitt Romney wins Iowa?”
HALPERIN: “If he wins Iowa, I think he will roll out of New Hampshire and I think he'll be in a strong position in South Carolina.”

But CBS’s Scott Conroy is a litttttle hedgier.

“I will say things have worked out sort of beyond the wildest dreams of the Romney campaign. … He's in pretty good shape. Even if he doesn’t win, if he’s second, he’s in great shape. If he is third, that's a little tougher...”

Some say part of his strategy is portraying himself as the eventual nominee.

And KPTV notes -- Romney’s been going less after his Republican opponents and taking more jabs at President Obama.

ROMNEY: “The gap between his promises and his performance is the largest I have seen since the Kardashian wedding in the promise until death do we part.”

Historically, no candidate has ever gone on to win the election who’s placed worse than third in Iowa. Then again, Bloomberg notes, even if he loses...

“...Romney is so well positioned in New Hampshire, a state his campaign views as its firewall, that he could survive the defeat.”

But this talk of inevitability doesn’t jive in ALL the polls.

Public Policy Polling puts Ron Paul ahead of Romney -- but says the momentum is Rick Santorum’s. The former Pennsylvania senator has seen a recent surge in poll after poll.

…Leading strategist Matthew Dowd to predict -- maybe Romney doesn’t have it QUITE in the bag. Here’s ABC.

MATTHEW DOWD: “I think it's Santorum, Romney, Paul, is how it ends up tomorrow night. Because of the surge at the end. Whoever has a surge at the end wins.”

We brought you the pundits’ predictions. Now, bring us yours. Let us know -- how do YOU think it’ll shake out?