On April 25 - Thursday evening - American icon and humble hero George W Bush took one small step for man, one slip-and-fall for humanity - as he re-entered a spotlight until-recently blissful to have been abandoned by him, for the dedication of his presidential library. Put aside for the moment that having an actual structure that houses things you read dedicated to him is like honouring Chris Christie with a gluten-free restaurant or naming a Bar Mitzvah after Vladimir Zhirinovsky. Hell, I half expected him to don his trusty flight suit and declare "all major combat operations over in Iraq", you know, just for the memories.

But really, he did not have to do anything of the sort. For it was perfect timing for the My Pet Goat Athenaeum to emerge from the steamy Sun Belt hydrofluorocarbons just as one disaster after another befell the country, a helpful reminder of the eight torturous (in more ways than one) years he and his corrupted West Texas ideology made the rest of the United States resemble, well, West, Texas.

From the explosion at the fertiliser plant due to flagrant flouting of environmental regulations to the attack in Boston, the rejection of common sense gun safety to the square dance around sequestration; this was shaping up to be a Bush Legacy week whether he stayed home to paint nude portraits of Jeb or chose to step out and try to defend a presidency many Americans must be still convinced was just one long phantasm brought on by a bad batch of Peyote.

Michael Lind points out in, Made In Texas, that we have had conservative presidents over the past century and southern presidents. We have not had the combination. And it is an important distinction. As Lind put it in an interview with BuzzFlash (2002), "His [Bush's] political values - ranging from aggressive militarism in foreign policy to small-government ideology and fervent support for laissez-faire economics" have come to define much of our political culture in Washington - hence last week.

First, we had the Festrunk Brothers launch an attack on the Boston Marathon two weeks ago, and just about everything involved had Bush's West Texas political culture written all over it. Because of the NRA, which "worked out of his White House", there is no way to track where gun powder was bought as there is with plastic explosives. Because... freedom! (And defence contractor profits!).

There was the fact that these two clowns apparently committed these atrocities because of anger over Iraq - for which I hope the younger brother (I refuse to give them attention by using their names) spends a nice, long, pain-enveloped life carving rocks into chess pieces at Shawshank. Ahh yes, Iraq. Remember that war? The one that George W Bush lied us into with tales of yellowcake and "curveball", that has now cost up to about $2 trillion?

It is because of this war, unpaid for tax cuts and Big Pharma boondoggles that we apparently have to eliminate Medicare, according to the Pied Piper of granny starving, Congressman and former vice-presidential candidate Paul Ryan. But let us eliminate, post haste, the part of our silly self-created "sequestration" - flight delays! - that causes inconveniences to wealthy members of the Congress on their way to the next Ladybank-single-malt-festooned, campaign contributor bribe-fests.

We were also recently treated to the West Texas answer to allowing weapons of war on our streets to blow apart toddlers in schools. Nothing. Unless you count Congress' finding ways to allow itself to insider trade again. Because... freedom!

Finally, there is the tragedy in West, Texas. A fertiliser-plant explosion near Waco (just like the Crawford pseudo-ranch!) that engulfed the neighbourhood, due to an understaffed and barely functioning Chemical Safety Board (by Congressional design), a lack of common-sense zoning requirements and the no-follow-ups rule we like to impose on the Environmental Protection Agency when they find that a plant like say, this one, had no risk management plan in 2006. But hey, the plant self-reported (is that like self-deporting?) that it posed "no risk" of fire, and why would they lie?

You may remember that a certain convict-Congressman named Tom DeLay - of West Texas - compared the EPA to the "Gestapo" and current lunkhead Texas Governor Rick Perry attacks the very same EPA for its "misguided and job-killing policies", as opposed to his people-killing ones. And then there is, once again, George W Bush. The Decider decided as President that, as dictated by his West Texas ideology, he would assault the EPA by any means necessary, short of naming the former Arabian Horse Association guy to run it (he saved that for FEMA... phew!).

So, in a way, it was fitting to see the George W Bush library opening this past week. It is his West Texas world. We are just stuck living in it.

This syndicated column first appeared at Al Jazeera English

Follow me on Twitter: @CliffSchecter

Something, indeed. After looking into all of the different right wing 501(c)(4) organizations and their associations, it's easy to see the metaphor of a tree with many branches. If the trunk represents the right wing as a whole, then each major limb of the tree represents a different set of affiliations under the overall right wing umbrella.

The Wellspring Committee, Inc. is a large limb on that tree, created to support the anti-gay, anti-woman, religious right Reaganites alongside pet agendas of other contributing billionaires. Despite the lofty language Wellspring used to describe its activities, the dictionary definition of their purpose is more apt: An original and bountiful source of money.

Who is Wellspring Committee?

Wellspring Committee (WCI) sprang to life in the waning days of the George W. Bush era in February, 2008. It is perhaps not a coincidence that its birth also coincided with the efforts of the National Organization for Marriage (NOM) and other groups to push California's Proposition 8 onto the November ballot, too. In fact, the president of WCI, Ann Corkery, is the spouse of Neil Corkery, who was the President of NOM in 2008 and now serves as Treasurer. Neil Corkery now serves as CFO of a group called the Wedgwood Circle, founded by Comcast mogul Phil Anschutz, Rick Perry bundler George Seay III, and many more. (See bios here).

Neil Corkery says in his bio that he "runs a financial consulting firm specializing in assisting non-profit organizations." Well, there's a convenient place to find oneself: at the crossroads of nonprofits and billionaires aching to buy their governments.

Ann Corkery served as a finance vice chair for Mitt Romney's first Presidential bid in 2008 and is employed by Security National Servicing Corporation as "Director of Philanthropy". Security National appears to specialize in lender-owned properties. I'm guessing they snag these properties at a song, keep them out of foreclosure and sell them at a profit. What philanthropy has to do with it is anyone's guess, but that's what Ms. Corkery does. She is uniquely positioned, as is her husband.

As you review Wellspring's acts of charity, you see tinges of Koch, DeVos, and mainline Republican fingerprints all over it. Clearly it's a major pipeline channel for right-wing organizations desperately in need of their billionaires' support.

Who does Wellspring Committee Support?

As it turns out, they're a pretty generous lot. Lucky recipients for 2010 included:

• American Majority: $1,020,125 Lots of grassroots to be had for the low, low price of a million.
• The Annual Fund: $2,450,000 This organization came into being on September 1, 2010 in time for the midterm elections, and closed its first year on September 30, 2011. This grant by WCI represents nearly all of its first-year income. It then turned and distributed nearly $1.5 million to Right Change in North Carolina, a group founded by Pharma King Fred Eshelman. RightChange targeted Patty Murray, Charlie Crist, Harry Reid and Michael Bennet in the 2010 midterms.

  $500,000 was also distributed by The Annual Fund to FreedomVote, Inc, an Ohio-based 501c4. FreedomVote's mailing address is a FedEx/Kinkos in Dayton now, but the originally reported address went to a Republican PR guy and Boehner crony by the name of Thomas Whatman, who also manages Boehner's PAC, Freedom Project. How that $500,000 was used, I do not know. They have a bare-bones website and little else. I found no records of independent expenditures with the FEC, and so it remains a mystery for now.

  Finally, The Annual Fund gave $475,000 to a group called Citizens for the Republic, which is yet another 501c4 organization launched by old-timer Reaganites and headed up by Craigan Shirley, of Shirley and Bannister lobbying fame.

  Other smaller grant recipients include Independent Women's Voice, where Heather Higgins is the Executive Director and was part of the bizarre James O'Keefe email loop regarding a conspiracy to frame the SEIU and undermine their get out the vote effort, and Enterprise Washington, which is a trade association group of businessmen in Washington state.

  One large grant grew many offshoots, didn't it?

• Citizens for the Republic - $360,000 This donation was in addition to the $475,000 passed through via The Annual Fund, and is one of the strongest indications that these organizations are used as conduits by groups of like-minded right-wingers.
• Faith and Freedom Coalition - $250,000 Ralph Reed's newest incarnation of the Christian Coalition.
• Franklin Center - $160,000 The Koch-funded propaganda apparatus operating out of Wisconsin
• Freedom Vote - Oh, look! Another $200,000 into a black hole of non-accountability.
• Federalist Society - $200,000
• RightChange - $900,000 - A companion contribution to the $1.5 million funneled through The Annual Fund
• Illinois Manufacturing Association - $500,000 I'm curious as to whether this group sponsored ads supporting crazy deadbeat dad Joe Walsh.
• Judicial Crisis Network - $350,000 - Don't be fooled by the name. It's a group formed to undermine democracy wherever it can. President Gary Marx is a long time associate of Ralph Reed. In their first reporting year of July 1, 2009 to June 30, 2010, they boast of spending nearly $800,000 to "[advocate] for the importance of judicial restraint in the debate over the 2010 hearing for U.S. Supreme Court nominee. It also became heavily involved in state supreme court nominations." The SCOTUS nominee mentioned had to be Elena Kagan. I suppose they're the ones who started the rumor that she's gay, too. That would explain part of their opposition to her nomination since they're a bunch of homophobes over that way.
• Better Courts For Missouri - $850,000 It seems right-wingers don't like elected judges very much, so they have been campaigning since 2008 to shift that over to the governor's office. Unfortunately, lawyers don't like it either, and this group failed to get the required signatures to place a constitutional amendment on the 2012 ballot. That hasn't stopped this group from pouring thousands into the state to unleash a huge propaganda campaign against "George Soros judges."
• Michigan Chamber of Commerce - $125,000 In 2010, the Michigan Chamber of Commerce was one of the preferred money laundering conduits for state races. Millions flowed through them and out to other states and candidates. Looks like this organization was a minor contributor.

In 2009, Wellspring was more or less dormant. A few small grants went out to Missourians for Better Courts, the Know Campaign, and around $111,000 was paid out for "citizen outreach regarding state level issues and policies." I'm guessing that was the beginning of the astroturf anti-health care reform effort, or maybe just general muckraking.

But in 2008, Wellspring was flowing like a river after a month of rain. You're starting to see the pattern here, right? Nothing much happens in the out years, but in those even years, boy howdy, they get busy. Here are but a few of their 2008 projects:

• Americans For Job Security: $2,605,824
• Americans for Prosperity: $2,000,000
• American Energy Alliance: $509,000
• Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce Association: $200,000
• American Future Fund: $367,500
• National Right to Life Committee: $542,000
• Susan B Anthony List: $753,000
• Louisiana Conservative Action Network: $312,000

You get the idea. WCI received a total of $10 million and change in grants, and flowed through about $7.3 in grants to other organizations. Of course, by serving as the conduit, the other organizations can disclose their donors without actually disclosing their donors. That leaves anyone who is interested simply guessing who the donors might be.

Call me cynical, but Ralph Reed's close ties to organizations receiving these conduit funds makes me feel like we're getting dangerously close to a more sophisticated operation that looks a lot like Jack Abramoff's past handiwork. I'm not sure anyone who was that close to that many millions and escaped any punishment isn't capable of reconstituting his money train yet again, using tax-exempt organizations and a desperate right wing to move him up prosperity road.

Make a note: The Wellspring Committee is one of several major players in the right wing network. Each has their function, and all the billionaires do is choose from the menu of organizations to use for the laundering operation, which is why I will continue to write these long, detailed, link-laden posts about them. Because even if you don't care much now, you will the next time one of these groups tries to shove their right wing candidates, agendas, judges, or news themes in your face.

Via Huffington Post:

Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R) urged state lawmakers Tuesday to pass more restrictions on abortion, and proclaimed that his end goal is to outlaw the procedure entirely.

"To be clear, my goal, and the goal of many of those joining me here today, is to make abortion, at any stage, a thing of the past," Perry said at a press conference organized by Texas Right to Life. "While Roe v. Wade prevents us from taking that step, it does allow states to do some things to protect life if they can show there is a compelling state interest. I don’t think there is any issue that better fits the definition of 'compelling state interest' than preventing the suffering of our state’s unborn."

Perry has already signed several bills into law that make it more difficult for women to access abortion services, including a mandatory ultrasound law and a bill that excludes Planned Parenthood from the state's subsidized women's health program. On Tuesday, he urged legislators to pass a bill that would ban abortions after 20 weeks of gestation, which is two to four weeks earlier in a pregnancy than the fetus would be considered viable outside the womb.

"Last session, we passed, and I’m proud to say I signed, a law that prohibits abortion without the mother first having a sonogram, because we believe that unborn children deserve the respect of recognition before their lives are tragically cut short," Perry said. "This session, I’m calling on the legislature to strengthen our ban on the procedure, prohibiting abortion at the point a baby can feel the pain of being killed. We have an obligation to end that kind of cruelty."

See, it's only cruel when the child is unborn. Rick Perry sees no cruelty in denying that child food or a roof over its head or a decent education or health care. Because once the child is born, it's no longer Perry's concern.

Love the fetus; hate the child. What a bumper sticker motto to have.

PERRY: This separation of church and state, which has been driven by the secularists to remove those people of faith from the public arena, there is nothing farther from the truth. When you think about our founding fathers, they created this country, our Constitution, the foundation of America upon Judeo-Christian values, biblical values and this narrative that has been going on, particularly since the ’60s, that somehow or another there’s this steel wall, this iron curtain or whatever you want to call it between the church and people of faith and this separation of church and state is just false on its face. We have a biblical responsibility to be involved in the public arena proclaiming God’s truth. You know, are we going to get up and say ‘you are going to vote for X’? No, but we’re going to talk about Christian values. When you think about the issue of life and protecting life, it’s so important that we as Christians put legislation into place, that we elect women that defend life. The idea that we should be sent to the sidelines I would suggest to you is very driven by those who are not truthful, Satan runs across the world with his doubt and with his untruths and what have you and one of the untruths out there is driven—is that people of faith should not be involved in the public arena.

Remember: this nutball has been governor of the second-largest state in the country -- and the largest, most powerful Republican state -- for 12 years.

Awesome.

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This is very significant. In fact, it's downright historic: The politician sticking his neck out to buck the NRA about states having the right to ban guns is... Rick Perry. This is a real "Nixon goes to China" moment, because a conservative Republican (from rootin', tootin' Texas, no less) carries a lot more weight with NRA supporters. It's a damned shame that neither presidential candidate has, to date, had that kind of political courage, but maybe Perry's statement will open the door to an adult discussion:

In an interview concerning the tragic shooting on Texas A&M campus on Monday, Gov. Rick Perry (R-TX) took a surprisingly moderate position on gun regulation. Although Perry rejected the suggestion that the shooting — the third high profile shooting in just one month — justified gun regulation in Texas, he also indicated that each state should be able to decide on its own whether or not to ban guns:

PERRY: When it gets back to this issue of taking guns away from law abiding citizens and somehow know this will make our country safer, I don’t agree with that. I think most people in Texas don’t agree with that, and that is a state by state issue frankly that should be decided in the states and not again a rush to Washington, D.C. to centralize the decision making, and them to decide what is in the best interest for the citizens and the people of Florida and Texas. That’s for the people of these states to decide.

Perry’s position, that each state should get to decide whether to “tak[e] guns away” from its citizens places him well to the left of the Supreme Court and the nation’s largest gun lobby. InMcDonald v. Chicago, the five conservative justices held that the Second Amendment applies equally to the federal government and to state governments, so an absolute ban on guns would not be constitutional if enacted at the state level (although bans on “dangerous and unusual” weapons would remain valid).

The National Rifle Association was the plaintiff in a sister case toMcDonald.Allowing each state to set its own gun policy, the position that Perry seems to embrace today, closely tracks the views expressed by dissenting Justices Stevens, Ginsburg, Breyer and Sotomayor in McDonald.

We haven't heard much from the Secessionist after his humiliating crash and burn in the Republican presidential primary, but I had to laugh when I saw this at The Corner.

“Texas changed, because it became a very economically strong state …. as people become more affluent, I will suggest to you, they make decisions about their political positions based on their economics and as a state becomes more affluent, as it becomes wealthier as jobs are created that in turn creates the wealth and people sit back and they go, well wait a minute. Why are they taking that much of my money away from me? …. And I believe that those individuals may be thinking about becoming Republican.”

Let's leave aside the fact that the Secessionist is basically branding the GOP is the party of selfish rich people -- his history is all wrong.

1. Since 1972, Texas has only voted Democratic in a presidential election once (1976). So what happened in the '60s? Did Texas Democrats enact a bunch of high taxes? Did Texans suddenly become less conservative? Of course not. What happened was the Civil Rights Acts and the Great Society. And just like every other state in the Old Confederacy, Texas flipped and joined the party of Lincoln in revolt. It's true that it took another 20 years for that shift to be complete throughout state, city and local politics, but that was the reason.

2. The last Democratic governor in Texas, Ann Richards, wasn't defeated in 1994 because Texans were annoyed she was "taking that much money away" from them. She was defeated, according to Karl Rove, because of guns and girl scouts.

Karl Rove, the Bush campaign strategist, listed three specific reasons that may have contributed to Richards's defeat: (1) her opposition to the concealed weapon bill authored by State Representative Suzanna Hupp, which was adopted and signed by Governor Bush in 1995; (2) her attempt and then her reversal on a proposal to place five Texas waterways under federal instead of state control, a move that could have halted development in Central Texas, and (3) her remarks at a Girl Scouts conference in Austin in which she warned the young women to beware of "Prince Charming on a motorcycle with a beer gut and a wandering eye."

To that list, I would add Rove's nasty lesbian whisper campaign against her.

3. Texas hasn't gotten any less poor since Republicans took over the state. The poverty level is slightly higher than it was in 1980, and in fact, the state got much poorer under Perry.

Republicans like the Secessionist can run away from the Southern Strategy all they want, but they can't hide.

You can’t run government like a business anymore than you can run business like a government. GOP presumptive nominee, Mitt Romney, burned corporations to the ground then made millions selling off the charcoal. This private sector experience is being touted as his qualification to be president. This expertise of bankaneering—corporate raiding—is so sexy to Republicans they now parrot the line, “President Obama doesn’t understand the economy,” implying Romney does because he’s been in the trenches breathing the fumes of leveraged buyouts.

It's like a fox claiming he has the insider knowledge to properly guard the hen house. “The farmer just doesn’t understand poultry.”

As billionaire Julian Robertson who after giving $1.25 million Restore Our Future—a pro-Romney superPAC—told NPR last week, “I think Barack Obama is a smart man that the electorate put into power without any qualifications to run the biggest business in the world, which is the United States of America."

The thing is the U.S. isn’t a business. Government isn’t a business just as an apple isn’t an orange. Running government like a business would be like running Yosemite National Park like a 7-Eleven—every inch is monetized to maximize profit--half off all 5-Hour Energy Shots on Half Dome! “A mountain of savings!” It’s a stunningly bad idea. It sounds clever in sound bites. They hope it sounds like Republicans are business friendly and quick with the flippant solutions: Government bad, business good—treat one like the other and both will be good! To me it sounds like the WIC (Women, Infants and Children) with a profit motive: another stunningly bad idea.

Vulture capitalism (to borrow a phrase from the leftist pinko Texas Governor Rick Perry) is hardly a good model for public service. Capitalizing on demolishing jobs doesn’t give you any insight into the common good, unless you take “common good” to mean just your wealthy friends.

This whole selling point of Romney having business experience therefore he’s the best to run the country implies that the economy collapsed because there wasn’t enough of a cozy relationship between government and business.

Yes, the world melted because Washington was too adversarial with Wall Street. It was Godzilla battling Mothra that trampled Main Street … instead of deregulated greed greased by conspiring politicians.

But Republicans, as you recall, came out firmly against empathy (when it comes to President Obama’s judicial appointments). But they feel empathy for corporations is what’s lacking in the Executive Office. They want a president who feels the pain of Big Business. Who understands that just like you and me corporations are people, my friends. And only the former CEO Romney can see eye-to-eye with a contrived paper-based legal entity.

It’s very telling that Republicans say government is a business and should be run like one. For them there’s no conflict—only interest. Government is just an extension of business. Like in 2007 when a reporter asked how many of Romney’s five sons were serving in the military. Romney’s answer: “One of the ways my sons are showing support for our nation is helping me get elected because they think I'd be a great president.” It’s just really all the same thing to Romney.

We don’t want our government to be run like a corporation. With any follow-up questions the analogy fails. Corporations don’t ensure rights. Especially rights which annoy yield like free speech and due process. Slavery was profitable. As was child labor. Pollution is profitable.

If making rich people richer was the sole purpose of government (like it is of corporations) we’d no longer have a country: We’d have Lehman Brothers.

But under a state law taking effect Wednesday, Henry and other eligible women won't be able to get care at Planned Parenthood clinics — which treat about 44% of the program's patients — or other facilities with ties to abortion providers, meaning those women will have to find new health-care providers.

The $40 million program is at the center of a faceoff between conservative Republican lawmakers and the federal government, which provides 90% of the program's funding. Although Texas already forbids taxpayer money from going to organizations that provide abortions, the law will cut off clinics with any affiliation to a provider, even if it's just a shared name, employee or board member.

Well, here's a problem. Medicaid funding has some conditions tied to it, and Medicaid funding provides about 90 percent of the baseline funding for the Texas Women's Health Program.

Via Huffington Post:

Cindy Mann, director of the Center for Medicaid and State Operations (CMSO), wrote Texas health officials a letter on Thursday explaining that the state broke federal Medicaid rules by discriminating against qualified family planning providers and thus would be losing the entire program, which provides cancer screenings, contraceptives and basic health care to 130,000 low-income women each year.

"We very much regret the state's decision to implement this rule, which will prevent women enrolled in the program from receiving services from the trusted health care providers they have chosen and relied upon for their care," she wrote. "In light of Texas' actions, CMS is not in a position to extend or renew the current [Medicaid contract]."

The federal government pays for nearly 90 percent of Texas' $40 billion Women's Health Program, and nearly half of the program's providers in Texas are Planned Parenthood clinics. But the new law that went into effect earlier this month disqualified Planned Parenthood from participating in the program because some of its clinics provide abortions, even though no state or federal money can be used to pay for those abortions.

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Washington DC - I arrived at CPAC, the Conservative Political Action Conference, around 9:30 a.m. People snaked around turnstiles waiting to get their badges certifying they had paid the $195 adult entrance fee.

Upstairs, the student line was much longer. They only had to pay $35. It's important to get young blood into the Grand Old Party.

They had paid to see the stars of the conservative movement. Mitt Romney, Rick Santorum, Newt, Marco Rubio, John Boehner, Mitch McConnell, even Sarah Palin has come out of hibernation and is scheduled to speak on Saturday.

There was talk of an Occupy infiltration and the finely dressed attendants were on the lookout. One man, wearing a cowboy hat and wielding a digital camera approached a police officer outside, "have you seen any occupiers?" he asked. "No," the officer responded.

Around noon I was sitting in a chair near the VIP room. Rick Perry was scheduled to speak at 1:20 p.m. in the Marriott ballroom. Three tall white men wearing suits and earbuds were seated across from me. One was standing. They briefly discussed security.

"I asked him if he wanted a walkthrough... and he said, 'I'm drunk, I don't care,'" said the older looking gentleman, who had apparently talked to the person he was securing.

Another one said, "Thanks for taking one for the team Rick."

After Perry gave his speech I attempted to ask him if he preferred bourbon or scotch, but he ignored me.

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At the beginning of the day, I started off at an event called "How to raise money... the easy way" put on by the Leadership Institute, a Republican training organization.

The speaker, Joel Mowbray, told the audience of mostly young men that "You make up a lot of ground with one $10,000 donation."

He said that there's no such thing as altruism and when a big donor cuts a big check the donor is looking for access.

"Asking for money bestows a level of credibility onto the campaign," said Mowbry, "It says I believe in my campaign." He told the audience the only two things a candidate should be doing is asking for money or asking for votes. Noted.

From there, I went to the massive Marriott Ballroom, which has been adorned with giant television screens, a huge stage and thousands of chairs, all filled, for Marco Rubio's speech.

The Florida Senator took the stage to loud applause. He made a speech about American Exceptionalism, how important it is that the U.S. remains the most powerful country in the world, a point Republicans often make.

"What happens if we diminish because we can no longer be the greatest country in the world?" asked Rubio.

"The greatest thing we can do for the world is be America," said Rubio. He added that we have to be an example for other countries, "the shining city on the Hill" he said, quoting Reagan, who took the line "city on a hill" from the Bible and made it shiny.

Reagan symbolism is all over CPAC. Pictures of him hang in the main lobby, stickers of his face are handed out and many speakers tied their speeches back to him.

Male CPAC attendees almost universally wore suits and females wore dresses. There were booths for ALEC, Tea Party.net, Hot Air, the NRA, Citizens United Productions, the Washington Examiner and Newt 2012, among others. One booth was selling Santorum sweaters. Surprisingly, I didn't see any Ron Paul supporters, despite the fact that his fans rushed the event last year to give him a strong victory in the 2011 CPAC straw poll.

I saw a number of people sporting Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum stickers, but I didn't see one person outwardly supporting Mitt Romney. In fact, during one speech in the Marriott Ballroom a speaker mentioned Mitt Romney and a female in the audience yelled out, "Mexican!"

In another room, much smaller than the Marriott Ballroom, I attended a panel discussion on labor unions. At this one, four men discussed the repeal of SB5 in Ohio, Scott Walker's actions in Wisconsin and heaped praise on Chris Christie. I arrived a little late, but I caught the gist of the conversation.

"I don't think revolution is too big of a word to use to describe what Chris Christie is doing," said Kevin Mooney, a reporter for the Pelican Institute for Public Policy, 'the leading voice for free markets in Louisiana.'

F. Vincent Vernuccio, a speaker from the Competitive Enterprise Institute, said that after the repeal of SB5, an-anti collective bargaining bill, Ohio would have to build a Berlin-style wall to keep people in. He said they'd flock to Indiana and Wisconsin, two states that have fought unions.

He said the failure in Ohio was the messaging, "We have to get our messaging together, we have to get our funding together and we have to break up the bills."

I walked out and went up the escalator to get a late afternoon lunch. As I rode the escalator up, Hot Air was interviewing Michelle Bachmann. She was in an all white dress.

As I was leaving I caught this guy talking about the tea party:

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As the outcry grows over Mitt Romney's shockingly low 15 percent tax rate, his bitter rival Newt Gingrich rushed to his defense. "My goal is not to raise Mitt Romney's taxes," Gingrich declared," It's to let everybody pay Mitt Romney's rate." Of course, as with his marriage vows, Newt isn't telling the truth. As it turns out, Gingrich has proposed a new capital gains tax rate - zero - that would almost eliminate Mitt Romney's already meager payment to Uncle Sam.

In South Carolina yesterday, Gingrich for once passed on an opportunity to take Mitt Romney to task. As ABC reported:

"We can confirm that I paid a 31 percent rate, and although let me be clear, the 21st century Contract With America has an optional 15 percent for every American," Gingrich said at a press availability in South Carolina. "My goal is not to raise Mitt Romney's taxes. It's to let everybody pay Mitt Romney's rate. And so I'm not going to criticize Mitt Romney. I'm going to say, shouldn't we all have the option of a flat tax at the same rate he was paying."

But that's not what Newt has actually proposed. His optional 15 percent flat tax rate is for ordinary income, not capital gains. And it is the capital gains rate which, thanks to the "carried interest" exemption for private equity managers, accounts for the minimal tax bill Mitt Romney pays on the millions he continues to earn each year from his former employer, Bain Capital.

In a nutshell, President Gingrich wants Governor Romney to pay 15 (and not 35) percent on his regular income and nothing on the millions in investment income that makes up most of his cash flow.

Here's how Gingrich's scheme for a budget-busting payout works for denizens of the gilded class like Mitt Romney. Like his former rival turned supporter Rick Perry, taxpayers could choose to pay an optional flat tax rate (15 percent in Newt's case, 20 percent in Perry's proposal). The corporate tax rate would be slashed from 35 percent to 12.5 percent. Like, Perry, Gingrich would eliminate the capital gains tax altogether. (As the Washington Post recently explained the impact of the already historically low 15% capital gains tax rate, "Over the past 20 years, more than 80 percent of the capital gains income realized in the United States has gone to 5 percent of the people; about half of all the capital gains have gone to the wealthiest 0.1 percent.")

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