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.....Everywhere Romney goes, he gets the strong support of the manipulators of the political apparatus--the elected politicians, the party committee officials, the staffers who hope their bosses will stay in office, the pollsters, the paid political consultants and Republican-leaning pundits who want to keep their sources. Like Obama, these Republican politicos look down on Santorum as the embarrassing, ne'er-do-well sibling who doesn't know when it's time to leave. They find his surge of support by the dumb party faithful as an annoyance. In the same way, the party operatives see Newt Gingrich, the one-time Speaker of the U.S. House of...

In Michigan, Santorum supporters planted hundreds of campaign signs in Shelby Township prior to Mitt Romney’s appearance today. Some of these signs were planted alongside sidewalks and roadways across from and surrounding the Romney campaign stop. Approximately two hours before the scheduled event, Romney campaign staffers, including Dennis Lennox of Topinabee, MI, began planting Romney signs in front of the location. Around the same time, several other people, who refused to identify themselves, began uprooting hundreds of Santorum signs along the roadway leading to the event. Signs placed at a commercial intersection were also removed. When asked to explain his...

So the first third of the Republican presidential race is ending. The first third is the introduction: "This is who I am, this is what I want to do, this is why you want to choose me." The campaign is announced, organized, and goes forward in key early states. The second phase is the long slog through the primary states to the convention next August in Tampa, Fla. The third and final is the election proper, in the autumn of 2012. *** The first phase was clouded by an overlay of frustration and dissatisfaction: The best weren't in the game....

Meet Rick Perry The lackluster group of candidates currently vying for the 2012 GOP presidential nomination has created a great deal of angst among conservatives. From Mitt to Newt to TPaw to Ron Paul, there hasn't been anyone who's truly inspired the base and inspired hope. Enter Texas Governor Rick Perry, the movie-star handsome, devout evangelical and fearless governor of Texas who has overseen impressive economic growth in the midst of The Great Recession. Over the weekend, Governor Perry addressed the Republican Leadership Conference, giving an inspiring speech that seemed all but certain to announce his candidacy for the...

I've given birth to five babies, and I've taken 23 foster children into my home," Michele Bachmann explained from the stage of the first major Republican presidential primary debate of the 2012 season. Jon Stewart would joke the next day that Bachmann was the winner of the primary "baby-off." Imagining himself as the moderator, "The Daily Show" host added: "And I just wanna ask everyone else here up on the dais, have you ever had to divide a birthday cake into 28 equal pieces?" The Minnesota congresswoman was answering a question about abortion and brandishing her most authentic credentials as...

This is a RUSH transcript from "The O'Reilly Factor," May 31, 2011. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated. BILL O'REILLY, HOST: In the "Impact" segment tonight: Fox News political analyst Charles Krauthammer, a very outspoken guy, as Donald Trump recently found out. So how does he see this weekend's Sarah Palin bus tour? Charles joins us now from Washington. So Hume and me, your humble correspondent, we feel that she's not going to run. First of all, do you concur? CHARLES KRAUTHAMMER, FOX NEWS ANALYST: I agree completely. I think it would make...

Charles Krauthammer's opinion matters. As any political junkie knows, Dr. Krauthammer is all at once witty, sublime, sarcastic, and serious. People listen to Krauthammer and care about what he thinks. Political junkies yearn for reliable scouts like him who speak plainly, tell the truth, and offer unique insights based on the truth. The most valuable characteristic an established "wise man" can have is the ability to see and tell the truth. Speaking the truth about current events is where Krauthammer seems to hit all the right notes. Only on very rare occasions does this maestro hit a decidedly sour note....

David Frum takes Sarah Palin to task for not being more public in her reaction to the shooting of Congresswoman Giffords, not being sufficiently empathetic, and not grasping the scope (no pun intended) of the accusations against her, What Palin Needed To Say After Giffords' Shooting: "Palin failed to appreciate the question being posed to her. That question was not: “Are you culpable for the shooting?” The question was: “Having put this unfortunate image on the record, can you respond to the shooting in a way that demonstrates your larger humanity? And possibly also your potential to serve as leader...

Two more prominent conservatives have gone public with the increasingly familiar view that Sarah Palin simply cannot win the presidency in 2012. The last few weeks have been very tough for Palin, with more and more conservatives voicing doubts about her fitness to be president (see Salon's guide to the criticism here) and her poll numbers dropping. The two latest doubters are columnist George Will and the RedState blogger Erick Erickson. They take two different routes to the same conclusion. Here's Erickson in a blog post today endorsing Rep. Mike Pence for 2012: But right now I am not excited...

Democrats were apparently under-represented in Delaware’s US Senate race on November 2, 2010, according to CNN exit polls taken on election night. Voter registration for Delaware’s 2010 election totaled Democrats: 47 %. Republicans: 29.4%. “Other” & Independents: 23.5% (Voter registration closed on October 9, 2010. Registration totals are as of October 21, 2010.) http://elections.delaware.gov/services/candidate/regtotals.shtml However, actual voter turn out according to CNN’s exit poll was: Democrats: 44%. Republicans: 30%. “Other” & Independents: 27% http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2010/results/polls/#val=DES01p1 Thus Democrats were under-represented among the actual voters who turned out in the November 2 election. Only 44% of actual voters were Democrats although 47% of...

Raw footage of CBS News anchor Katie Couric recording voice-overs for news segments about Gov. Sarah Palin on the day she was named as John McCain’s running mate: [...] What’s newsworthy here isn’t merely that Couric mocked the GOP’s historic Vice Presidential nominee–most of us have said things we’re not proud of in private–it’s that she did so so brazenly in front of her supposedly objective news team. Conservatives4Palin raises another good point about Couric and Co.’s efforts to marginalize the former Alaska governor from day one: “[W]hat in [Palin's] impressive biography did CBS News and Couric choose to focus...

The following video was sent to C4P’s tips account. As you can see, the video shows Katie Couric preparing to go on the air on the day John McCain announced Governor Palin as his running mate. It shows some tantalizing hints of Couric’s attitude toward the Governor--when talking about first Trig, then Track, Couric says “where the hell do they get these [names]?...” At that point the producer running the sound board shut off the sound because he or she didn’t want to have Couric’s disdainful and contemptuous view of Governor Palin’s children captured on even an internal CBS tape...

Mitt Romney is wading into the GOP governor's primary in Michigan, and he's backing Rep. Pete Hoekstra (R-Mich.). Hoekstra faces state Attorney General Mike Cox and businessman Rick Snyder in a pitched primary battle. Gov. Jennifer Granholm (D) is term-limited, and Democrats are waging their own primary battle.

Canada Health-Care scandalStep one: Some provocative yet murky detail emerges about something she said or did, usually it comes from a leftist blogger. In this case, that’d be her admission that as a kid (6 years old) her family once crossed the border to seek medical care for her brother in Canada when Anchorage was 45 minutes away. Step two: The media assumes the worst and beams out the shocking allegations taking out of context.( she is supposedly for socialize health-care at the age of six!)Step three: Media corrects the story later on in the day, but it is too...