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Fred Karger walked into a coffee shop in Manhattan looking every inch the sort of man who wants to be a Republican presidential candidate. The long-time "Grand Old Party" operative, who has served three different Republican presidents, had close-cropped grey hair and wore a sharp blue business suit. He clutched a folder of campaign literature and handed out a T-shirt emblazoned with "Iowa 2012". But one key detail made Karger a little different in a Republican field swirling with names like Jeb Bush, Mitt Romney, Sarah Palin and Mike Huckabee. On his suit lapel Karger wore a badge pairing the...

The presidential field may be wide open, but one candidate is playing the role of the inevitable front-runner, as his performance at the Conservative Political Action Committee Conference this weekend shows. Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney brought with him to the event a large entourage that stayed for several days, while most other potential candidates dropped in and out of the conference to make their speeches and headline a reception or two. Other serious contenders brought just a few key staffers, but many didn't even have their top political aide in tow. Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin and former Arkansas...

To the dismay of all but hard-core political junkies, the endless campaign is a reality of modern politics. With some midterm races still unresolved, voters’ attention is already turned to 2012. And no potential presidential candidate now garners more attention than former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin. Love her or hate her, admire her or fear her, respect her or ridicule her, it seems no one in the chattering class is without an opinion on Palin. Virtually every part of her life is dissected — sometimes by her own choice. Each word is scrutinized, and each misstep — no matter how...

President Barack Obama and senior White House officials urged top lawmakers to pass a measure this year that would allow gay men and women to serve openly in the US military. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said the Senate would vote on a measure to end the Pentagon's Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy after the Thanksgiving holiday break. "Our Defense Department supports repealing 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' as a way to build our all-volunteer armed forces," Reid said in a statement. "We need to repeal this discriminatory policy so that any American who wants to defend our country can do...

For many Republicans, the bright, golden haze of Election Day is marred by a thunderhead on the horizon -- the increasingly erratic political interventions of Sarah Palin. In the past, Palin embodied the populist style of the Tea Party movement while espousing a fairly mainstream Republican ideology. On economic, social and foreign policy, Palin seldom strayed from a simplified, popularized Reaganism. The mama grizzly may have been ferocious, but her talking points came from the Heritage Foundation instead of from darker corners of the right. But this election season has called that perception into question. Palin's endorsement of Christine O'Donnell...

There's a better chance of seeing Governor Christie mingling with President Obama at the private dinner reception in Cresskill on Wednesday than finding him on stage with Sarah Palin or any other Tea Party gathering, for that matter. The pugnacious, rant-and-ramble governor may sound like a Tea Party activist from time to time, and Glen Beck may be smitten with a severe case of political man-love, but in reality Christie wants as little to do with them as possible. He prefers the high ground of the GOP establishment, perched at a safe distance from the roiling Tea Party tide. That...

Partisan Democrats are delighted about Christine O'Donnell's Republican primary victory over Rep. Mike Castle in the race for the open Delaware Senate seat. I’m despondent. From the Democratic point of view, the defeat of the moderate, well-known Castle turns what had looked to be a lost cause into a likely win. Keeping the seat in Democratic hands could be the margin of control in the Senate. So the folks who focus on electing Democrats and keeping a Democratic majority can't be blamed for breaking out the champagne over O'Donnell's win. Not me, for two reasons. First, I had thought the...

Talk about going rogue. Meghan McCain, who fancies herself the hippest, most progressive young Republican in America, talked some trash last night about Sarah Palin. I know, where have you heard this song before? Ever since Palin imploded in her Katie Couric interview before the 2008 election, just about everyone involved in John McCain’s presidential campaign – the candidate excluded – has publicly declared how they never really liked Mama Grizzly to start with. Now the candidate’s daughter is piling on. In an interview with Jay Leno to publicize her recently-released book, Dirty Sexy Politics, Meghan McCain confesses to weeping...

Yeah, you read that right. May Sarah Palin get the 2012 GOP nomination. Putting her on the top of the ticket would be the best thing that could happen to the GOP, and here's why: Unless Barack Obama totally blows the next two years, she would get waxed in a general election. Then she would be out of the way and the GOP can go about building a strong, broad coalition, the kind that can lead to a governing coalition. I've more or less said that before about Palin, but reading her undermining of GOP Sen. Lisa Murkowski's reelection bid...

Newsweek reports that Mitt Romney is taking a different and unique approach than other potential 2012 candidates are. Unlike other politicians, including Obama himself, who feel compelled to offer their opinion on every issue that stirs controversy, Mitt Romney remains focused on the core issue that worries, as well as, unites Americans: the economy. But now, while Palin and Co. are using the Ground Zero mosque controversy to burnish their far-right bona fides, Romney is seizing on the kerfuffle as an opportunity to do something else entirely: prove that he’s the only potential Republican nominee with the fortitude to ignore...

Former Bay State Gov. Mitt Romney - believed by many political observers to be a clear GOP front-runner in the 2012 presidential race - is virtually in a dead heat with contender Sarah Palin, according to a new CNN poll. The poll shows Romney only 3 percentage points in front of former Alaska Gov. Palin, within the margin of error. “It’s a pretty open contest, and that’s interesting in and of itself,” said Suffolk University political professor John C. Berg. “It means the primary contest will be tighter.” Only months from the unofficial start of the 2012 presidential campaign, Romney...

The five-month-old Republican gay group GOProud wanted to create a big splash with its first convention, Homocon 2010 (that is a real name that we did not make up). And to do so, they lined up a whopper of a headliner. Says chairman Christopher Barron: "The gay left has done their best to take all the fun out of politics, with their endless list of boycotts and protests. Homocon is going to be our annual effort to counter the ‘no fun police’ on the left. I can’t think of any conservative more fun to headline our inaugural party then the...

So, Barack Obama’s approval rating is falling so quickly that it may soon be journeying to the center of the earth. So, the economy is in such terrible shape that those supposedly untouchable middle class tax cuts may expire. So, Florida happens to have three of the most corrupt politicians in the country running for one of its United States Senate seats. So, what? Instead of my usual weekly analysis of political happenings across the United States, I have decided to take a different approach with today’s article. A few nights ago, I stumbled across a very interesting study conducted...

If the Republican nomination in 2012 shapes up as a two-way race between former Alaska governor Sarah Palin and 2008 presidential candidate Mitt Romney, expect fireworks to fly. Last week, GOP primary voters caught a glimpse of how things might play out between the two Republican heavyweights when anonymous aides from both camps exchanged pointedly personal barbs. The scuffle began when Time magazine’s Mark Halperin anonymously quoted one Romney aide in a column last Thursday, blasting Palin for her lack of substance, “She’s not a serious human being.” Another aide to the former Massachusetts governor ripped into Palin, arguing, “If...

Truth in advertising: I've been an off and on, Mitt Romney supporter. By and large, off. But I'm beginning to wonder if maybe Mitt deserves a second look.

An ABC News review of Mitt Romney’s new book ends thus: “If history is any guide, however, Romney stands a decent chance of getting his party’s nod. Although he was hurt last time by questions about his authenticity, Republicans have a long tradition of nominating second-time candidates: think Richard Nixon in 1968, Ronald Reagan in 1980, George H.W. Bush in 1988, Bob Dole in 1996, and John McCain in 2008″ This is the conventional wisdom; we’re all used to hearing it. It’s the idea that Republicans nominate the “next-in-line” candidate, or the runner-up from last season’s primaries. It’s superficially plausible....

Ron Paul Wins CPAC 2012 Presidential Straw Poll

Ron Paul 31% Mitt Romney 22% Sarah Palin 7% Tim Pawlenty 6%

SUMMARY: He says: "Who in their right mind, if they were African-American or Hispanic or Asian-American, if they were gay or lesbian, would join the Republican Party?" Democratic National Committee chairman Howard Dean came under attack for speaking out against conservative gay men and lesbians as well as Republicans of color. "They can't become more diverse," Dean said Tuesday at a speech at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. "Who in their right mind, if they were African-American or Hispanic or Asian-American, if they were gay or lesbian, would join the Republican Party?" The Log Cabin Republicans issued a statement Wednesday against...

This is why a lot of people wanted Fred Thompson in the race. Who do you trust? Mitt today or Mitt from...whenever he changed his mind on abortion. What? Three years ago? That doesn't smack of a real change of heart more than a political calculation. If the abortion issue doesn't bother you then listen to Mitt run from the "Reagan-Bush" years.