The Virginia abortion bill, which would mandate that the women seeking an abortion get a trans-vaginal ultrasound – a forcible assault at the very least – before having the procedure, has received entirely too much notoriety for the tastes of conservative lawmakers in the state. Today, as Laura Conaway reports, protesters held a silent demonstration outside the Virginia legislature, which was enough for them to delay the vote on the measure.

In their ongoing quest to make themselves look completely retrograde and ridiculous, House Republicans will hold a grandstanding hearing on the Administration’s birth control access rules tomorrow, featuring testimony from a leader of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops and other opponents.

A new poll shows that the lack of forceful opposition to Administration counter-terrorism policies, especially from Congressional Democrats, has led to them becoming broadly popular. This is true even for controversial policies like the continued presence of the prison at Guantanamo Bay, or drone strikes abroad.

The full 30-minute attack ad called “When Mitt Romney Came to Town” is out, and it is really hardcore. Dolloped with a hint of xenophobia (Romney speaks French in the film twice), the film features the roadkill from the freight train of vulture capitalism, the workers who had the misfortune of getting caught up in a Bain Capital leveraged buyout. Romney is portrayed as such an unyielding greedhead that Gordon Gekko would blanch.

The latest polls show a three-way race between Mitt Romney, Ron Paul and Rick Santorum. Movement toward Santorum sprung from one poll, from CNN, which sampled only Republicans, despite the ease of same-day party registration in Iowa and the expectation of up to 20-25% of the caucus electorate being composed of Democrats and independents.

Thanks to Citizens United and a subsequent court decision, Super PACs can raise unlimited sums, and spend it all advocating directly for or against a candidate, as long as there’s no coordination between the Super PAC and the candidate’s campaign. But this prohibition against coordination doesn’t really have much significance in the real world.

A lousy approval rating doesn’t make re-election any easier, but it’s not everything.

Elizabeth Warren’s success and the enthusiasm around her campaign has knocked every potential challenger in the Democratic primary out of the race. She has the ability to stay competitive with the Wall Street-backed Brown in fundraising, and the attacks put forward by the likes of Karl Rove have been laughable. Warren is still a neophyte candidate and a lot can go wrong; she probably needs to improve among independents, and you could see some gaffes and distortions of her record coming into play. But at the moment, she is well-positioned to enter the Senate.

Whether Herman Cain is actually reassessing his campaign or not, he’s done on the Presidential stage. And the data show that the biggest beneficiary of this is Newt liberal-hater Gingrich.

That’s right, a guy who pocketed $300,000 to shill for Freddie & Fannie, ran up a six-figure tab at Tiffany, and who’s been part of the Washington establishment for 32 years — this is the guy Teabaggers want to put in the White House.