Free Republic

SALEM, N.H. - Presidential hopeful Mitt Romney in an interview Monday dismissed concerns he's too nice to be a viable candidate in a vicious race, proving it by taking a swipe at yet-to-announced GOP rival Fred Thompson. "We all get the chance to go on the talk shows. But it's not the sort of questions you get in the debates or the town meetings that I've had," Romney said in an Associated Press interview, alluding to plans by Thompson to formally announced his candidacy during a planned Wednesday night appearance on the "Tonight Show with Jay Leno." "The talk show...

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IN JUST two weeks, Fred Thompson will finally announce his formal entry into the 2008 presidential race and instantly become the biggest Republican threat to Rudy Giuliani. The long-anticipated move by the former "Law and Order" star begins today with his arrival at the Iowa State Fair, where he will face his first real test before actual voters. Giuliani still holds a 10-point advantage over him in national polls, according to RealClearPolitics, but Thompson has seen his own support steadily grow while Giuliani's slowly erodes, from a high of nearly 40 percent earlier this year to below 30 percent now....

Many Republican faithful, from the grass roots to the Capitol, have concluded that Fred Thompson, the preternaturally avuncular actor and former Senator from Tennessee, is the cure-all for their party's ills. Thompson has yet to enter the presidential race, and yet Thompson already shares front-runner status with former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani in some national polls of gop voters. Thompson will spend the rest of the summer raising money, which he was scheduled to do conspicuously at a donor event in Washington on July 28. Another advantage to waiting: the longer he remains an unofficial candidate, the longer...