KING: The Perry campaign has bought the most Iowa TV ads, yet the final polls show Governor Perry running fifth among the six candidates contesting Iowa. So, before spending a little time with us today, Perry asked his final Iowa crowds to consider the 2012 stakes.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PERRY: This election is about stopping a president of the United States and his administration that is abusing the Constitution of this country, that is putting America on a track to bankruptcy. And, folks, we are going to take America back. That's what this is about.

(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Governor Perry, I appreciate your time on such an important, busy day.

You have never lost an election. And if you look at numbers, things look pretty bleak tonight. What happened?

PERRY: Well, let's wait until tomorrow before we say whether anything looks bleak or not.

There's 40 percent of the people that are still out there haven't made their decision, and I have got over 500-plus people that have come over 32 states to work the phone banks and to caucus for us tonight. So I feel pretty confident that we're going to come out of Iowa with some good momentum and head on to the other states and this thing is a long way from being over. So it's a marathon. It's not a sprint.

KING: Senator Santorum has surged in recent days. His folks are going to go into those caucuses tonight, sir, and they're going to look the Bachmann people in the eye, they're going to look the Perry people in the eye, and they're going to say, they're good candidate, but we need to have a single conservative emerge from Iowa as the alternative to Mitt Romney.

How do you counter that?

PERRY: Well, I agree with that analysis. It's correct.

And I'm the only person who has got a national organization, who has the ability to raise the money nationally, and has the ground game in these other states to do that. So that is an absolute correct analysis, but it's not Rick Santorum. And, frankly, Rick's going to have a real problem when he leaves and people start vetting his background from a fiscal conservative standpoint.

This guy's the king of earmarks and pork barrel spending. He was the liaison between Washington and K Street. And he's got some real bags that he's going to have to explain to people. And that's going to be a problem for him.

KING: If you wake up tomorrow morning and see Governor Perry in a disappointing fourth or a disappointing fifth, is there any point where you would say, you know what, that's a message, we're going home, or are you going to South Carolina regardless?

PERRY: I'm headed to South Carolina.

The plane will be warmed up in the morning and we will be headed to Aiken, South Carolina, to continue on. I mean, the idea that one or two states is going to decide who the next nominee for the Republican Party is, is just -- you know, that's not reality.

This is a 50-state campaign. And it's about the future of America. And I think Americans are ready for an outsider who will go to Washington, D.C., and overhaul the place, an executive who has got the governing experience of 11 years of running the 13th largest economy in the world, and doing it in a way that has made Texas the number-one job creation state in America.

That's what Americans are pining for, someone who will get Washington off of their back, out of their pockets, and allow entrepreneurs to have the freedom to risk capital and create jobs. And I'm it.

KING: If Governor Romney comes out of Iowa with a win or a strong second and then wins New Hampshire, how do you stop him in South Carolina?

PERRY: Well, I just think you go and share with the people of South Carolina the real message of who has the consistency and is an authentic conservative.

I mean, Mitt Romney has got a real problem when it comes to consistency. Those folks in South Carolina, I can promise you, they're not going to buy a pig in a poke, so to speak. And a Massachusetts governor that put individual mandates in place that Obama took as the model to create Obamacare is not going to sell in South Carolina.

KING: Do you worry at all, sir, that you will have a repeat of 2008? Huckabee, a Christian conservative candidate, wins the state of Iowa. John McCain comes back and wins the state of New Hampshire. And in South Carolina, Fred Thompson stayed in the race. And so McCain ekes out a victory.

If you look through the data -- and I have scrubbed it for years, sir -- if you look at it, if Fred Thompson doesn't stay in, Huckabee probably wins South Carolina, you have a very different race back in 2008. Are you worried at all that if a Perry, a Bachmann, a Santorum, and others stay in the race, that you're essentially spoilers on the right, and you allow Romney to sneak through?

PERRY: I think this election -- and you will probably agree with this, John -- is so different than any election that you have ever seen in the past, that to try to go back and make some comparables between an '08 or an '04 or a 2000 election with what's going on right now is an interesting exercise, but the fact is, this election is far from decided.

And today won't decide it, I will suggest to you. South Carolina will come near giving us a better clue who's going to be the Republican nominee. But we're going to work hard the rest of the day here, and expect to have a good showing.

KING: I couldn't agree more that one of the big things we will look for tonight is how different is this Republican Party from the Republican Party four years ago? How do the evangelicals break? How does the Tea Party break?

Governor Perry, appreciate your time on a very busy day. Best of luck in the final hours in Iowa. And we will see you ahead on the road in South Carolina.

PERRY: John, thank you.

KING: Thank you, sir.

PERRY: Godspeed.