A whole lot of carts are getting put before the horse in the Romney campaign — but their aspirations are as uninspiring as their candidate.

Tomorrow, the Republicans controlling the Minnesota State Legislature will be voting behind closed doors on whether to put an ALEC-assisted measure on this November’s ballot that will effectively strip the right to vote from tens if not hundreds of thousands of Minnesotans.

Since Rick Santorum’s triple win last week the state of the Republican primary has changed dramatically. In the past 24 hours four major national polls have found Rick Santorum slightly leading or effectively tied with Mitt Romney. In addition the polls found Newt Gingrich’s support has falling significantly since his January peak.

The good news for Rick Santorum keeps on coming. Santorum now has surged to a modest two point lead over Mitt Romney in Pew Research national Republican primary polling. The poll was conducted from February 8-12 directly after Santorum’s three big wins last Tuesday.

Rick Santorum’s surprise triple win last week in Colorado, Minnesota and Missouri has proven to be an amazing shot in the arm to his campaign. His polling numbers have skyrocketed both nationally and in the upcoming primary states. Santorum is surging in Michigan, where he now holds a 15 point lead over Mitt Romney.

It isn’t just contraceptives the Republicans want to take away:

How must it feel to be Mitt Romney right now, seeing Rick Santorum bubbling up to the top in the latest national polls? Is he starting to get the hint yet that — presumptive front-runner or not — the Republican base just doesn’t want him to be their nominee for the White House?

No two major media outlets agree on GOP delegate counts, although almost all have the ranking the same: Rmoney, Santorum, Gingrich, and Paul. The exception being the most trusted name in news: CNN ranks the contenders Rmoney, Gingrich, Santorum, Paul.

While some are calling yesterday’s change of policy with regard to contraception coverage a win-win for both the Catholic church and the Obama administration, the US Conference of Catholic Bishops does not see this as a win. Instead, they see it as one small little step, and they are pressing for much, much more.

The first amendment’s protection of religious liberty is not a license for religious organizations or individuals to disregard any law or regulation they don’t like. If the White House wants to end this fight, that’s the argument they’re going to have to make to the public. Instead, they have allowed the USCCB to set the terms of the debate, and the USCCB is quite happy to continue doing so.

This isn’t over, folks. Not by a long shot.

As part of an ongoing look at ALEC and its pet legislators, I’m looking at why certain ALEC bills (such as the Minnesota anti-voter “voter ID” bill which, having been shot down by both an ACLU lawsuit and a Mark Dayton veto, is back for its third go-round as a ballot measure) keep getting revived even after being shot down for unconstitutionality and other reasons.