Free Republic

Speaking om FOX News, citing Romney's business and political experience, Pawlenty, the first major candidate to drop out of the 2012 GOP race, endorsed Romney.

The conventional wisdom among the political punditry is that 2012 Republican frontrunner Mitt Romney will be hamstrung by the health-insurance plan he helped craft as governor of Massachusetts, which included a mandate to purchase insurance. That may not be true. In conservative circles, the health-insurance mandate has become shorthand for government overreach. But while each GOP presidential hopeful has disavowed it on the campaign trial, in recent days two of Romney’s top competitors — former Utah Governor Jon Huntsman, who hasn’t declared his candidacy, and former Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty, whose Iowa barnstorming tour is well underway — have faced...

On Morning Joe today, Mika Brzezinski asked Tim Pawlenty to assess the strength of one of his potential rivals, Donald Trump, and the former Minnesota governor tried at first to remain positive, calling Trump “talented” and “interesting.” When it came time to assess Trump’s apparent platform of birth certificates, Pawlenty was decidedly less positive: Tim Pawlenty says Donald Trump needs to get off the birther circuit. In an interview on MSNBC’s Morning Joe, the former Minnesota governor said there are more serious concerns to weigh. “I, for one, do not believe we should be raising that issue,” Pawlenty said. “I...