Free Republic

The Romney campaign, renowned for its oppo-heavy strategy, didn’t even have an oppo book on Rick Santorum a few days before the Iowa caucuses, so surprised were they by his surge. Jon Huntsman nearly decided in November to leave the GOP and run as an independent. And before one of the debates, Rick Perry sang “I’ve Been Working on the Railroad” in a restroom. These details are from Mike Allen and Evan Thomas’ new e-book, Inside the Circus, as are these additional factoids below. Mitt Romney raised millions in March by warning would-be donors a brokered convention could mean a...

(Reuters) - Mitt Romney is struggling to regain control of the race for the Republican presidential nomination, but his allies appear ready to offer him a strong crutch for the road ahead. Restore Our Future, the independent "Super PAC" that supports Romney, spent $13.5 million in January on ads attacking his rivals and still emerged with $16.3 million in the bank, according to disclosures filed Monday with the Federal Election Commission.The pro-Romney PAC, or political action committee, spent $12.3 million alone on TV, Internet and radio ads that went after former U.S. House of Representatives speaker Newt Gingrich, Romney's chief...

"The main reason the Republican establishment overwhelmingly favors Mitt Romney over Newt Gingrich is that Romney stands a better chance of beating Barack Obama," says Jonathan Chait at New York. So it's a problem for Romney that "as the campaign goes on, this seems to be growing less true." A new Washington Post/ABC News poll shows that negative views of Romney have "spiked" over the past two weeks, from a net +4 favorability rating (39 positive/34 negative) to a -18 rating (31 positive/49 negative) — very similar to Gingrich's -22 rating (29/51). The shift is most notabe among independents, who...