The Republican base is still not particularly enthusiastic about the field of potential presidential nominees according to Pew Research. It appears Mitt Romney is on track to winning, not because he is a great candidate, but simply because he managed to be the best of a rather pathetic lot.

To the extent Santorum can make this a race, he’s helped by winnowing the field. Michele Bachmann cancelled planned events in South Carolina and will hold a press conference back in Iowa this morning. Similarly, Rick Perry, in his campaign concession speech, said he would go back to Texas and “reassess” the results.

Finally, after a very long campaign defined by too many debates, an endless parade of short lived surges to first place and frankly some incredible silliness combined with SuperPAC negative ads, people will actually start voting in Iowa on who will become the Republican party’s presidential nominee.

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.

In the litany of the Religious Right, Lawrence is critically important to know. It’s not only important to LGBT activists; it’s one ruling the Religious Right rails against when they talk about activist judges. It’s a big deal.

With less than a week until the Iowa Caucuses, things are looking for good for Mitt Romney. The recent polls find him leading in the state or coming in a close second behind Ron Paul. Either would be a positive outcome for the Romney campaign.

Republicans hate public employees. But they hate retired public employees even more. And they hate most the public employees who are still on the job while they take a public employee pension at the same time. So how will this newest revelation, of Rick Perry’s double-dipping, convince the GOP base voters that Rick Perry should rise back to the top of the primary polls again?

It’s a presidential primary as docu-comedy. Some talking jumping beans mount the debate stages and the talk shows and tell us, one after the other, that he or she must be out next president if the Republic is to be saved. Begging the question, from what exactly?

Rick Perry’s claims notwithstanding, not all Christians think LGBTs should be discriminated against. Yesterday’s Minneapolis Star-Tribune carried a powerful pro-equality voice: retired ELCA Presiding Bishop Herbert Chilstrom.

The tide is turning, both inside the church and beyond. And it’s not moving in favor of bigotry, homophobia, exclusion, and hate.

For most of this year, Mitt Romney’s strategy seemed to be working beautifully.

With the Iowa caucuses only a few weeks away, though, there’s not much time left for Newt Gingrich — the latest standard-bearer for tea-party Republicans’ tangled fantasies and resentments — to self-destruct.