Free Republic

Mitt Romney, who has been silent up to this point on the Obama campaign's extensive attacks on his private equity career, defended his experience in an interview with conservative blogger Ed Morissey, distancing himself from the closing of a steel factory at a Bain-owned company and accusing the president of talking out of both sides of his mouth on private equity. Here's what he said: "The most recent attacks are really off target and I think they know. They said, oh, gosh, Gov. Romney at Bain Capital closed down a steel factory. But the problem, of course, is that the...

...Washington— After locking up much of the Republican establishment's heavyweight fundraisers, Mitt Romney is going after the little guy. "Donate $3 today to be automatically entered to be Mitt's special guest for Election Night on Super Tuesday," reads an email appeal from the Romney campaign to supporters. A dramatic new Web video asks for $20 contributions to fight the "Obama Attack Machine." The GOP presidential candidate made a similar solicitation after clinching the Michigan primary Tuesday, with a rare personal plea for people to visit his website and "pledge your support — in every way possible." The pitch reflects a...

The Michigan Republican Party voted to break a delegate tie Wednesday night, awarding 16 delegates to Mitt Romney and 14 to Rick Santorum. The decision, which broke a 15-15 tie that would have resulted under the pre-primary interpretation of the rules, caused disbelief at Rick Santorum’s campaign. A spokesman rejected the decision. Even Romney supporters in the Michigan GOP said the decision was unfair to Santorum. “I have this crazy idea that you follow the rules,” said former Attorney General Mike Cox said after a 4-2 vote by a Michigan GOP credentialing committee, according to the AP. “I’d love to...

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT RUSH: I'm minding my own business yesterday -- (interruption) put a stop to what? What do you mean am I gonna put a stop to the primary? I really don't understand. What do you mean? Oh, no, no, no. It's not time to put a stop to it, anoint anybody and say that we're done. Newt's not getting out. He's gonna stay in through Super Tuesday. That's where he's got all of his money banked. This thing could go on as far as May. Santorum's not going anywhere. Santorum doesn't have a lot of money even now. Romney...

Sarah Palin’s not running for president, but up until this month she has been beating GOP front-runner Mitt Romney in a different kind of race. For the past few months, the ex-Republican vice presidential candidate has been whooping the former Massachusetts governor in one website’s merchandise sales. CafePress.com, which lets customers design and sell their own clothing items and other merchandise, finds that in December, Palin-inspired gear far outsold items featuring Romney, 80 percent to 20 percent. An average of 137,000 designs are uploaded to the website each week. Even last month, people were still picking Palin over the White...

Mitt Romney acknowledged on Wednesday that his path to the Republican presidential nomination is not going to be easy after three shock losses to newly ascendant rival Rick Santorum. A day after Santorum beat him in Colorado, Minnesota and Missouri, Romney attempted to play down the results, saying his campaign did not devote a lot of time and money to the three state nominating contests and chose to compete strongly elsewhere.

Mitt Romney, asked if there were any lessons learned in the wake of losing all three Republican voting contests Tuesday night, said that he simply “wasn’t there to respond” to former Sen. Rick Santorum’s attacks in the days leading up to voting. But today, speaking to reporters on a tarmac in Atlanta, where he flew from Colorado after losses in Minnesota, Missouri and Colorado Tuesday night, he did not hesitate to go on offense, accusing two chief GOP rivals of behaving “like Democrats.”

I’m so tired of the refrain that a critique of Mitt Romney’s work at Bain is “an attack on capitalism.” Capitalism means that you RISK capital, so that you will profit if things go well and you will incur a loss if things go poorly. Private equity firms, like Bain, are in the business of maximizing profit for investors (not to “create jobs” as characterized by Romney supporters), which is perfectly reasonable and legal. To do that, private equity firms often make investments then extract “consulting fees” and “special dividends” in excess of the original investment to ensure that no...

Romney Supervised Medical Testing Company Guilty Of Massive Medicare Fraud In 1989, Bain Capital purchased controlling interest in Damon Corp., a medical testing company located in Needham, Massachusetts. During the time that Bain held its ownership of the company, Mitt Romney personally sat on the Board of Directors. And during that same period, Damon Corp. was busy submitting fraudulent reimbursement claims to Medicare to the tune of millions of dollars charged for unnecessary blood tests.

Dear Mitt: In this year's contest for the Republican nomination, you have demonstrated your ruthlessness. Your attacks on fellow Republicans have show that you are willing to be as brutal, vile, and remorseless as is necessary to defeat your opponent. Presumably, this is how you made $200 million in about 12 years at Bain. In 2008 and now in 2012 you have left a field of wounded warriors in your wake: Huckabee, Giulianni and now Newt. We can see you are willing to be as dirty and nasty as you need to be to win. But the question remains, will...

Ronald Reagan’s eldest son Mike Reagan has issued a statement lambasting Mitt Romney and his supporters for claims that Romney’s Republican presidential rival Newt Gingrich was a strong critic of President Reagan. Reagan says such claims are false. Even Rush Limbaugh, shocked by the Romney claims, chimed on his Thursday radio broadcast to say "This is obviously a coordinated attack to take Newt out here in Florida." Rush slammed the Romney-backed smear campaign against Newt. “That kind of stuff is why people hate Romney so much," Limbaugh said. Limbaugh added that Newt has always been a conservative from his early...

GOP front-runner Mitt Romney struck an especially low blow at Newt Gingrich in South Carolina Tuesday: He compared the former speaker to Al Gore. Speaking at a rally at Wofford College in Spartanburg, S.C., the GOP front-runner derided Mr. Gingrich’s claim during a debate Monday night that he had a hand in the creation of millions of jobs during Ronald Reagan’s presidency. Mr. Romney noted that Mr. Gingrich was only in his second term in the House when Mr. Reagan became president, and argued that the private sector, not government, is responsible for job creation.

Reporting from Florence, S.C.— Newt Gingrich on Tuesday questioned why Mitt Romney has not released his tax returns, arguing that if the front-runner for the GOP presidential nomination has nothing to hide, he ought to make the documents public before South Carolina holds its first-in-the-South primary on Saturday. "Either there's nothing there, so why isn't he releasing them, or there's something there, so why is he hiding them?" Gingrich told reporters here after holding a town hall at an art gallery. "I believe we have the right to know. Therefore, he owes us the knowledge. If there's nothing there, why...

After weeks of stalling, Mitt Romney did an about-face on Tuesday and said he will release his tax returns in April and that they will show he pays close to 15 percent of his income in taxes. Romney, a multimillionaire, has been under pressure from his rivals for the Republican presidential nomination and others to release the information. He'd previously said he wouldn't release it. He suggested Tuesday that he would make public only one year's worth of information, for 2011. Speaking to reporters after a campaign stop in South Carolina, Romney said most of his income comes from investments,...