The Republican presidential primary contest isn’t over, but in the race to line up the richest donors, it’s Mitt Romney vs. President Obama.

Romney has drawn the most support from billionaires, with at least 42 donating to his campaign. Obama is not far behind, with at least 30 billionaire supporters. Rick Perry and Jon Huntsman Jr. follow with 20 and 12, respectively, according to donor rolls and the current Forbes magazine list of 412 American billionaires.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/in-race-for-campaign-funds-from-billionaires-romney-outpaces-obama/2011/12/01/gIQAxQLsXO_story.html?hpid=z1

A despotic regime could continue using child labour for up to 20 years and still improve its international standing as long as reforms were under way, according to strategy prepared by senior executives from the lobbying firm Bell Pottinger.

While repeatedly insisting to undercover reporters posing as businessmen from Uzbekistan that it would be necessary to instigate reforms in the country they suggested that slow progress need not be an impediment to better international relations.

"No one is suggesting it would be realistic to say tomorrow the problem will disappear," said Tim Collins, managing director of Bell Pottinger Public Affairs.

"But we need to put some flesh on the bones of what movement in the right direction looks like.

"So it might be step by step, something like this, set a timeframe, 10, 20 years in the future when it will all be gone completely, but we take it step by step."

He stated that a minimum age for child labour and a limit on the number of days schoolchildren could work in the cotton industry could be introduced to improve the country's standing.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/exposed-how-lobbyists-put-positive-spin-on-child-labour-6273822.html

White House hopeful Newt Gingrich took the gloves off on Saturday as he defended his frontrunner status in a feisty debate among the narrowing field of Republican presidential contenders.

Faced with a barrage of attacks on his conservative credentials, history of adultery and controversial remarks calling Palestinians an "invented" people, the former House speaker played tough and kept his cool as he stood his ground.

Slammed by his rivals for "stirring up trouble," Mr Gingrich insisted that "the Palestinian claim to a right of return is based on a historically false story," adding: "These people are terrorists. They teach terrorism in their schools."

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2011-12-11/gingrich-defends-lead-at-republican-debate/3724874

IOWA CITY – Newt Gingrich, in full professorial mode, stood at a lectern in front of a whiteboard decorated with his campaign signs on Wednesday and told an auditorium of college students that brain science research was not only “fascinating,” but “a way to fix the budget” over the next decades.

“Why as a politician am I this intrigued?” Mr. Gingrich asked students at the University of Iowa. “Because there are very direct consequences as relates to the quality of life and the budget.”

http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/12/14/gingrich-lecturing-on-brain-science-faces-protesters/

One's need to be Newt Einstein these days...

...

Gingrich was born a Lutheran, became a Southern Baptist at Emory University and converted to Catholicism in 2009. He and Callista, who is a paid singer in the Basilica choir, have made the shrine their stage, becoming stars on the Eternal Word Television Network, which films there.

The Basilica Bookstore sponsored a book signing for Gingrich’s 24th book, “To Save America: Stopping Obama’s Secular-Socialist Machine.” And the Gingriches produced a documentary last year about John Paul II, celebrating the pope who rejected attempts to liberalize the church.

For anyone who grew up with relatives who could never get annulments even when their spouses abandoned them after a brief time, it was galling to see Gingrich — who divorced twice to marry younger mistresses, and who left his wives when they were sick — be celebrated at a conversion Mass by Washington’s church hierarchy at St. Joseph’s on Capitol Hill, where Robert Kennedy attended Mass daily when he served in the Senate.

Monsignor Walter Rossi, the rector of the Basilica, told Goodstein that he had met weekly for seven months with Gingrich to instruct him.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/21/opinion/dowd-separation-of-newt-and-state.html?hpw

Newt Gingrich declared confidently the other day that he would get his name on the ballot for the Republican presidential primary in Virginia. In fact, he said he already had the requisite 10,000 signatures and an additional 2,000 to 3,000 for safety’s sake and would probably collect even more.

But that turned out not to be the case. In the wee hours of Saturday morning, the Virginia Republican Party announced via Twitter that Mr. Gingrich had failed to submit enough signatures by the Thursday deadline, highlighting the organizational challenges to his campaign and raising questions about his prospects in a drawn-out nominating fight.

Many of the Gingrich campaign’s signatures were apparently invalid, which is why most campaigns try to collect almost twice as many as needed. Gov. Rick Perry of Texas also failed to make the grade.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/25/us/politics/gingrich-falls-short-of-signatures-needed-for-spot-on-gop-primary-ballot-in-virginia.html?_r=1&hp=&pagewanted=print