According to Time's Mark Halperin, on Thursday, Mitt Romney will deliver a speech on health care, "complete with PowerPoint presentation," explaining how he'll repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act with something better. This could be because Mitt has been working hard on this issue and cares about it deeply, or it could be because Mitt's biggest problem with Republican primary voters is that he passed a plan in Massachusetts very similar to the Affordable Care Act, or as The Onion put it, "Mitt Romney Haunted By Past of Trying to Help Uninsured Sick People."

During the 2004 election, the GOP pushed anti-same-sex marriage amendments onto the ballot across the country to turnout their base voters for George W. Bush’s re-election campaign. LGBTQ civil rights may once again be at stake in the 2012 election season if a series of connected state-level conservative organizations have their way. At The Minnesota Independent Andy Birkey details an extensive effort underway called "Ignite an Enduring Cultural Transformation," which seeks to fund ballot initiatives against same-sex marriage in 15 different states next year.

According to the latest survey from Public Policy Polling, Donald Trump is doing incredibly well with the Republican primary electorate:

Trump's broken the perpetual gridlock we've found at the top of the Republican field, getting 26% to 17% for Mike Huckabee, 15% for Romney, 11% for Newt Gingrich, 8% for Sarah Palin, 5% for Ron Paul, and 4% for Michele Bachmann and Tim Pawlenty.

First Read points out that Mitt Romney announced his candidacy for the presidency yesterday and it was a day before the fifth anniversary of the passage of healthcare reform in Massachusetts. The guys at First Read write:

Yet it may be fitting that Romney jumped into the presidential waters so close to that anniversary, because Massachusetts’ law will define his primary candidacy. He either figures out how to navigate and wins the nomination, or the issue kills his chances. It may be that simple.

With the country growing less white by the year, and Democrats currently enjoying huge electoral advantages among the nonwhite, will the Republicans double down on their strategy of stoking white grievance? Our Adam Serwer says yes, Jonathan Chait says probably not, or at least they'd be dumb to do so. But it's worth thinking about whom and what we're talking when we talk about what "Republicans" will "do."

In addition to a Mormon problem, David Bernstein argues that Mitt Romney has an abortion problem as well:

[I]t really is true that Romney ran into incredible resistance to Mormonism, particularly among evangelical voters (and thus, particularly in the South). But again, I think that resistance really grew after. I don't think so many preachers would have been describing Mormonism as such an abomination at the time, if they had been more disposed toward Romney as a candidate.