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Mitt Romney and Sarah Palin are the clear leaders of the 2012 Republican presidential primary field, according to a new Gallup poll released Thursday. Romney and Palin were the only potential candidates to earn more than 15 percent in the poll, with Mike Huckabee trailing not far behind. The three former governors were the only candidates to receive more than 10 percent, with Romney receiving 19 percent, Palin getting 16 percent and Huckabee at 12 percent. Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich came in fourth in the poll, getting 9 percent, reports Politico. Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas) was the only other...

WASHINGTON -- Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney is the early frontrunner among potential Republican candidates for president in 2012, according to a new McClatchy-Marist poll. While former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin commands the national spotlight, turning out "tea party" activists and headlining rallies, for now it's Romney who claims the lead at 25 percent, months before an official field takes shape. Palin, GOP nominee John McCain's 2008 running mate, took second with 18 percent. Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee tied for third place with 16 percent. Finishing out the pack were Minnesota Gov. Tim...

Via GOP12, I’m surprised that this modest statement of painfully obvious fact is making waves today. Click the image below and skip ahead to 8:00 for the money part, although the whole thing’s worth watching. He starts with a cute bit about phoning the families of National Guardsmen to say hi, proceeds to talk about Campaign ’08, and then after the part about Obama praises Palin for her “energy and spunk and passion.” (“Code words,” says Ben Smith, trying to stir up trouble.) What makes this newsworthy, I guess, is that it’s a rare caution about hubris at a moment...

As the poll numbers roll in and the sound bytes accumulate, the possibility of a Sarah Palin presidential campaign seems more and more likely. Whether or not the Republican party will say okey-dokey to her candidacy in the primaries is even more uncertain than if she's going to run or not, but if you ask me, she plans on at least giving it a shot. Sure, she hasn't actually come out and said "I will run for President in 2012," but she has promised us she would "give it a shot," assuming a few vague qualifiers be fulfilled. The success...

So Mitt Romney - the venture capitalist guru who never sweats - leads all Republicans in a new Zogby poll that has him within striking distance of Obama, 45-43. Can anyone be surprised? The economy’s a mess. We’re basket cases over keeping jobs and homes. Obama’s reduced to courting Whoopi and Barbara Walters today on “The View,” hoping a cozy chat will reassure the wives of independents and/or Tea Party sympathizers who’ve abandoned the president in droves. Close your eyes. Envision, for a second, the best known GOP contenders: Sarah Palin, Mike Huckabee, Newt Gingrich, Ron Paul. On the Ward...

So Mitt Romney - the venture capitalist guru who never sweats - leads all Republicans in a new Zogby poll that has him within striking distance of Obama, 45-43. Can anyone be surprised? The economy’s a mess. We’re basket cases over keeping jobs and homes. Obama’s reduced to courting Whoopi and Barbara Walters today on “The View,” hoping a cozy chat will reassure the wives of independents and/or Tea Party sympathizers who’ve abandoned the president in droves. Close your eyes. Envision, for a second, the best known GOP contenders: Sarah Palin, Mike Huckabee, Newt Gingrich, Ron Paul. On the Ward...

Even as the starting bell rings for the first round of the Republican presidential free-for-all, we’ve got a couple of anonymous Mitt Romney advisors coming off the top rope, aiming elbow smashes at Sarah Palin’s back. They said she’s “not a serious human being” and “if she’s standing up there in a debate, and the answers are more than 15 seconds long, she’s in trouble.” This childish and incoherent nonsense does a lot more damage to Mitt Romney than Sarah Palin. What, exactly, are the criteria for being considered a “serious human being?” Should she just give up her half-hearted...

Huckabee’s taken potshots at her from time to time, but between this fusillade from unnamed Mitt advisors and the furious counterattack on Romney at Conservatives 4 Palin, I’d say that the 2012 primary is now, at long last, officially on. In the immortal words of Greg Stillson, “The missiles are flying. Hallelujah.” Still, few express much regard for Palin’s ultimate chances. One adviser to Mitt Romney, the former Massachusetts governor, and, by traditional standards, the putative 2012 frontrunner, says of Palin, “She’s not a serious human being.” Another Romney intimate warns, “If she’s standing up there in a debate and...

The elections of Nikki Haley, who is poised to become the first female/first Indian governor of South Carolina and Tim Scott, poised to become the second black Republican congressman to serve in Congress (and who won against a segregationist's son, Paul Thurmond) were momentous and historical for all the obvious reasons... That being said, I do not expect the lamestream media to give these stories as much coverage as they deserve mainly because their "conservatives want segregation back" mantra is quite frankly the only age-old tactic liberals have to rely on for any hope of keeping their shackles on the...

Immediately after Nikki Haley's overwhelming victory in the South Carolina Primary, we noted Team Mitt's panic over the credit Governor Palin received: It appears Mitt Romney is getting a bit nervous as a result of all the well-deserved credit Governor Palin received for helping Nikki Haley in South Carolina, both in the media and by Haley herself. In fact Romney is so nervous he feels compelled to return to South Carolina to campaign for Haley before the runoff on the 22nd. [...] This is classic Mitt Romney. When all the mud was flying and Governor Palin publicly and steadfastly stood...

Republican gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman received high-profile support in appearances in Escondido and Fullerton Saturday, with former Gov. Pete Wilson and former presidential candidate Mitt Romney stumping for her. In Fullerton, Whitman appeared in the courtyard of the mission-style Villa Del Sol complex where she made her candidacy official in September. Like that event, several hundred people stood under the baking sun to listen to the candidate. Wilson preceded Romney and called Whitman a threat to public employee unions, warning, "They have a very good reason to be scared to death of Meg Whitman." Whitman has pledged to cut state...

PHOENIX (AP) - John McCain is calling in former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney on Friday. McCain and Romney are scheduled to appear together at a town hall meeting in Mesa.

Sometime around the time Barack Obama won the White House, I started wondering who would inherit the Republican Party. I have to admit I felt a little schadenfreude when George and Dick drove the GOP off a cliff, but I also named this space “Common Ground” for a reason. We need to focus on what unites us more than the things that divide us. Here’s some common ground: We need two functioning political parties to continue to meet the challenges of our times. Unlike Karl Rove, I don’t want one party to run the country. Hammering out public policy through...

Yesterday, I was interviewed by a reporter for CBS, for a story on the diverse groups of people supporting Sarah Palin online. The reporter authored a book on Palin last year, after being embedded with her vice presidential campaign, following a stint covering Mittens Romney. I can’t imagine how many cucumbers-and-mayonnaise sandwiches this guy had to eat on the Romney Express (to nowhere), but I gave him the same kind of awed respect I grant anyone who’s ever spent more than half an hour with Tim Pawlenty — and didn’t succumb to T-Paw induced narcolepsy. We (the reporter and I,...

Link only, per FR posting rules

The boyhood home of former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney is slated to be torn down as part of an effort to rejuvenate Detroit. The 5,500-square-foot home, built in 1918 and located on a .4-acre lot in the toney Palmer Woods neighborhood, has fallen into disrepair in recent years, a neighbor said. Romney and his parents, George and Lenore, lived in the home from 1941 to 1953. Shortly after moving from the home at 1860 Balmoral Drive, George Romney became chairman of American Motors Corp. and, later, governor of Michigan. Attempts to reach Romney spokesman Eric Fehrnstrom yesterday were unsuccessful. The...

PPP has polled Newt Gingrich and Ron Paul for the first time in the potential 2012 Republican presidential race nationally, and their presence reduces support for the other candidates, particularly Mitt Romney. What was a decent advantage for Romney in a three-way race with Sarah Palin and Mike Huckabee is now a four-way draw, with Paul in a distant fifth and Romney slipping to a close second. Huckabee has 25 to Romney’s 23, Gingrich’s 21, Palin’s 20, and Paul’s 8, with only 3% undecided versus last month’s 17% with more limited options. Gingrich’s entry into the field erodes Romney’s support...

Madame "Too Busy To Vote Even Though I Had A Household Staff" isn't holding up well now that the people who do vote are paying attention. Meg Whitman would be an absolute disaster for California. At best, she's Arnold Schwarzenegger in drag. At worst, she's a more masculine version of Jerry Brown.

The race to win the GOP presidential nomination – is gearing up. It, too, has a large field, but this race is a marathon that takes four years to complete. Now, the time has come to begin handicapping the 2012 primary race. This list represents a snapshot of a moment in time, with fluid odds and a constantly changing field. Keep in mind that if this list were compiled a year ago, Mark Sanford's name would have been included – and possibly John Ensign as well. But that's horse-racing. Just ask the owners of Eskendereya, the consensus favorite to win...

"As a band of noisy nurses derided her as "Queen Meg," Republican gubernatorial front-runner Meg Whitman brought a quartet of GOP heavy-hitters to the Peninsula on Friday night to raise a half-million dollars for her candidacy. U.S. Sen. John McCain of Arizona, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and former Secretary of State George Shultz praised the former eBay CEO as a smart and pragmatic woman who would keep California from plunging over a cliff. "She can get the job done," said Shultz, now a fellow at Stanford's Hoover Institution."