Free Republic

The political axiom is familiar today. Republicans nominate the next in line. So it's been from Richard Nixon to John McCain. The next presidential cycle could prove otherwise. The GOP establishment no longer rides herd over today's elephants. Conservative activists are both exceptionally galvanized and autonomous. It's a unique mix unseen in decades. And critically, the establishment's early favorite has an Achilles heel. This conservative milieu begs the question: is 2012 the year of the Republican dark horse? Mitt Romney should be the next Republican nominee. No less than 81 percent of Republican "insiders" say that Romney is the "most...

SALT LAKE CITY (ABC 4 News) - A new poll shows Republican Mitt Romney leading all current GOP challengers by more than 20 points in New Hampshire. A Public Policy Polling survey released this week shows Romney crushing other GOP contenders among New Hampshire Republican voters with 39 percent of the those polled. Sarah Palin came in a distant second at 13 percent, while Newt Gingrich and Mike Huckabee tied for third with 11 percent. Ron Paul came in fifth. 13 percent were undecided.

Mike Huckabee has overtaken Mitt Romney in (a way-too-early) survey of Republicans asking who they would support for the 2012 GOP presidential nomination if the primary was held today. A CNN/Opinion Research poll, conducted April 9-11, had Huckabee leading Romney 24 percent to 20 percent. Last month, Romney had the lead by 22 percent to 17 percent. Sarah Palin comes in third at 15 percent closely followed by Newt Gingrich at 14 percent. Texas Rep. Ron Paul gets 8 percent and everyone after that is in low single digits.

NEW ORLEANS -- Mitt Romney won the straw poll at the Southern Republican Leadership conference here Saturday in a victory that will be taken as a sign of the former Massachusetts governor's strength as a 2012 presidential candidate. That's because the 2008 GOP presidential hopeful elected to skip the conference to continue his book tour. Romney triumphed by a single vote over Ron Paul, who took second place 439 votes to 438. Both men won 24 percent of the vote. Sarah Palin and Newt Gingrich essentially tied for third with 18 percent of the vote each.

The Southern Republican Leadership Conference Straw Poll doesn't carry a whole lot of weight, since it's skewed — like most of these things — by the makeup of the crowd, the intensity of Ron Paul's supporters and the ease of gaming the vote. That doesn't mean, however, that the various camps aren't trying to game it. One of the organizers told me that two groups, Paul's Campaign for Liberty and Evangelicals for Mitt (which denies ties to Romney) have purchased blocks of tickets to the event, typically given to supporters.

We’ve done a million posts about this three-way match-up but I don’t think we’ve done one yet about a key swing state. Not what I would have predicted. Florida’s the first really important stop on the GOP calendar that we’ve looked at, and Romney’s lead there is overwhelming. He gets 52% to 21% for Huckabee and 18% for Palin. It’s closer, but still a double digit advantage, in Colorado. There Romney gets 44% to 25% for Palin and 17% for Huckabee.

Mitt Romney was on the David Letterman show last week and hit a home run. It was two white guys from the Midwest, born in 1947, chatting amiably about the icons of yesteryear: Earl Scheib, the car-painting magnate; the Studebaker (a car, for you younger readers) and the Rambler Classic, manufactured by AMC, the automobile company managed by Mitt’s father, George. AMC and Studebaker were wiped from the face of the earth by better cars made in Japan by more diligent workers, although that is not a subject that came up. Letterman saved the last minute of Romney’s appearance for...

The United States presidential election of 2012 is the next United States presidential election, to be held on Tuesday, November 6, 2012. It will be the 57th quadrennial presidential election in which presidential electors, who will actually elect the President and the Vice President of the United States on December 17, 2012, will be chosen. Democratic President Barack Obama will be eligible to run for his second and final term during this election. Tina Hemond political analyst comments on how the U.S. Presidential 2012 race is heating up. She writes, “With Jay Leno back in NBC’s preferred timeslot the battle...

1. Mitt Romney: Romney gave a command performance at CPAC -- delivering a solid speech aimed at establishing himself as the de facto leader of the party and offering a detailed critique of the Obama Administration and its policies. And, his decision to put Matt Rhoades, communications director of his 2008 presidential bid, in charge of his Free and Strong America PAC was a savvy move that won him kudos among party insiders. Romney appears far more at ease in this race than he did in 2008; he knows who he is and what he can (and can't) do --...

Jay Leno made news when he announced that Sarah Palin will be among his high-profile guests when he returns to The Tonight Show next week (aka "The Jaysurrection"). Now David Letterman's lineup for next week pits Mitt Romney against Sarah Palin on Tuesday night -- and the ratings may well provide clues on which probable GOP presidential contender may be most popular. The week's lineup for Letterman's Late Show are: MONDAY, Bill Murray; TUESDAY, Mitt Romney; WEDNESDAY, Jerry Seinfeld and Tom Brokaw; THURSDAY, Tom Hanks; and FRIDAY, Matt Damon. Leno's first week of guests are: MONDAY, Jamie Foxx, Olympic Gold...

Ron Paul was the straw poll winner at the CPAC convention last weekend – but Sarah Palin is the early frontrunner in bluegrass country. Colorado-based GOP pollster Magellan Strategies threw a POTUS 2012 question into a statewide poll of 560 Kentucky Republican voters and found Palin leading the pack with 28 percent of the vote – with Mike Huckabee a close second with 24 percent. Mitt Romney was at 16 percent, undecided landed at 14, Newt Gingrich got 12, followed by Paul with 4 percent and Tim Pawlenty dead last at two percent. The takeaway: Huckabee’s going to be a...

ABC News’ Rick Klein reports: For those reading 2012 implications out of Sen.-elect Scott Brown’s victory in Massachusetts, Mitt Romney’s monthly PAC newsletter provides some insights. Brown, R-Mass., is featured in two pictures in the newsletter, and Romney takes full ownership of his victory: “As supporters of the PAC, you deserve a thank you,” the newsletter from Romney’s Free Strong America PAC reads. “Your support made it possible for Governor Romney to get behind Senator Brown from the very beginning, when polls showed him a 30-point underdog and everyone assumed the outcome was pre-ordained in favor of the Democrats.” “Governor...

The upper echelon of Republican Scott Brown’s Senate campaign in Massachusetts is filled with staffers who once worked in former Gov. Mitt Romney’s employ. But with the eyes of the nation on the state’s Jan. 19 special Senate election — and with other Republican luminaries such as Rudy Giuliani traipsing through Massachusetts for Brown in recent days — Romney himself has been conspicuously absent. Despite his status as one of the GOP’s most prominent national figures and a prospective 2012 presidential candidate, the former Massachusetts governor hasn’t appeared publicly with Brown since late October. Back then, when almost no one...

Sarah Palin’s plan to deliver the keynote address – for a fee – at next month’s first-ever National Tea Party Convention is getting renewed attention in light of her rejection Thursday of an invitation to speak at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference. The decision to blow off CPAC – traditionally seen as the year’s must-attend event for the conservative establishment – in favor of a little-known convention is prompting some soul-searching among CPAC supporters, and is being interpreted as a calculated play by the former Alaska governor to cast herself as the potential 2012 GOP presidential candidate of the...

A poll of GOP insiders suggests that ex-AK Gov. Sarah Palin (R) has little support among the party's professional class -- and maybe that's just how she wants it. In a survey of 109 party leaders, political professionals and pundits, Palin finished 5th on the list of candidates most likely to win the party's '12 WH nomination. Ex-MA Gov. Mitt Romney (R) was the overwhelming choice of the Voters were asked to rank 5 candidates in the order of likeliness to capture the GOP nod. The results: Likely To Win WH'12 Nomination (First place votes) Ex-MA Gov. Mitt Romney 81...

Besides the occasional Republican either voting for socialized medicine or preventing a filibuster of it, the guilt of the association with the proposal that passed the Senate and the GOP is very deep. In fact the recent bill, without the public option (but will force people into public care) looks increasingly like the failed experiment of Massachusetts.

Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney will make two stops in Iowa in March as part of his nationwide book tour, following visits by fellow 2012 GOP hopefuls Mike Huckabee, Sarah Palin and Tim Pawlenty. Romney’s second book, “No Apology: The Case for American Greatness,” is due out March 2, and the promotional tour will take the former GOP presidential candidate to 18 states. Romney will visit first in the nation Iowa on March 29, signing books at the Des Moines Central Library and making a speech at Iowa State University, located in Ames.

Mitt Romney - that rare political breed, a Republican elected statewide in Massachusetts - told supporters yesterday that if Scott Brown can pull off a similar feat next month in the US Senate special election, it “would shock the country and send a strong message that business as usual in Washington is coming to an end.’’ “He would bring badly-needed fiscal restraint to an out-of-control budget process that is adding trillions of dollars to our national debt,’’ said Romney, the former Bay State governor who gives every indication he’s preparing a second presidential bid in 2012.

SALT LAKE CITY — Still looking for that perfect gift for the Mitt Romney fans on your Christmas list? How about a ticket to Romney's only Utah appearance on his upcoming tour to promote his just-finished book, "No Apology: The Case for American Greatness"? It's not until March 13, but tickets for a speech by the former presidential candidate at the Salt Palace go on sale at 10 a.m. Thursday. The tickets, priced at $25 through Jan. 31 or $95 with a private reception with Romney, include a pre-signed copy of the book that's scheduled to be released March 2....

Here is video of Gov. Mitt Romney on with Sean Hannity tonight where he discussed the Democrats' push to pass a Health Care Bill in the Senate by Christmas. On the economy, Mitt Romney said the Democrats have failed to create jobs, particularly with the Stimulus Bill passed early this year. Romney said "borrowing your way to prosperity" is a strategy that will not work. Romney said the "American people are a lot smarter than the Democrats give them credit for." Romney said he would give Obama "a failing grade" on his performance as President thus far. Instead of focusing...