Romney

PRICES WERE out of control at the end of third-century Rome, and the Emperor Diocletian was determined to rein them in. In AD 301 he issued his famous Edict on Prices , a complex piece of legislation that banned speculation and established price ceilings for a wide range of goods and services. But the ambitious law failed. Though violators could be punished with death, inflation and speculation persisted. Goods were hoarded, or sold on the black market. The economic crisis worsened.

Mitt Romney unveiled a series of changes primarily intended to give low-income families more choices in education and improve schools. The proposal would: ▸ Substantially change how the federal government allocates money to those K-12 schools with a high percentage of low-income children and for the education of disabled children. Currently, that money generally goes to the school districts. Under Romney's plan, such children at low-performing schools would be able to use that money to attend another public school, charter school, or, if states allow it, private school.

Polls show that frustration with Washington has never been higher — and who could argue? Most Americans believe the country is on the wrong track. Most lawmakers openly concede that nothing will get done before the November elections. The leaders of both parties are already trading threats over the possibility of a national debt default next year. Barack Obama got elected by promising to change the tone in Washington, but clearly he's failed, as George W. Bush did before him. That should be a clue that the partisan animosity consuming the political system doesn't originate in the White House.

Mitt Romney's campaign has released a new ad promoting "Day One" of a potential Romney presidency, describing which of President Barack Obama's policies the Republican will reverse first if he wins the White House. The ad promises that in his first day in the Oval Office, Romney will announce deficit reductions, ending what the campaign calls "the Obama era of big government. " It says Romney will stand up to China on trade and demand "they play by the rules. " And the ad says Romney will repeal what it calls "job-killing regulations that are costing the economy...

The leading donor to Mitt Romney's super PAC is not a hedge-fund manager or Bain Capital executive. It is Bob Perry, a Houston home-building magnate who was also the top donor to the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth campaign against John F. Kerry, the Democratic presidential nominee, in 2004. Along with Foster Friess, who was Rick Santorum's benefactor, and Sheldon Adelson, Newt Gingrich's patron, Perry has become one of the most important, if least known, members of an elite class of Republican moneymen who are almost single-handedly reshaping the race for the White House.

DES MOINES — One broad question has dominated the campaign in Iowa this year: Whether to choose the purest conservative or to back a candidate who seems most able to win and govern? Last night, Iowa essentially punted on that question. At deadline, the results were essentially a three-way tie. And despite all the chatter about enduring doubts concerning Romney, that's basically good news for him. Why? Because he is far better positioned for the long haul and far more plausible a nominee than either Ron Paul or Rick Santorum.

President Barack Obama sought to undermine Mitt Romney's key rationale for his presidential candidacy Monday, sharply attacking his Republican challenger's background as a venture capitalist and arguing that profit-making alone is not a qualification for the White House. "His main calling card for why he thinks he should be president," Obama declared, "is his business experience. " It was Obama's most expansive argument yet against Romney, and the president delivered it from a world stage in his home town.

You can find more of Dan's work on his blog, Out of Line .

In January 2010, he was the golden boy, the political operative who helped Scott Brown pull off what many had thought impossible: wresting Edward M. Kennedy's old US Senate seat from the Democrats. Since then, however, victories have been elusive for Republican strategist Eric Fehrnstrom, whose consulting group has lost its last six races. Fehrnstrom is now trying to return to reprise his victorious ways as he juggles two of the most prominent campaigns in the country: Mitt Romney's effort to turn his on-again, off-again front-runner status into a term in the White House, and Brown's...

Mitt Romney struggled to find support for his education proposals while campaigning at an inner-city school Thursday, one day after declaring education the "civil rights issue of our era. " The visit, the first by the likely Republican presidential nominee to such a school, came as he begins to court a broader cross-section of the electorate he needs to defeat President Barack Obama in November. In a speech Wednesday, Romney proposed expanding charter schools, which are privately run but funded by taxpayers, and creating a voucher-like system in which poor and disabled students could...

WASHINGTON - Mitt Romney says that if he is elected Congress should wait until he takes office to block automatic spending cuts and to keep tax cuts from expiring. In an interview with Time magazine Wednesday, the Republican presidential candidate said he wants Congress to deal with major issues to keep the nation from going over a "fiscal cliff" after the January swearing-in. Romney said he wants permanent legislation to deal with those problems instead of a temporary effort.

Vice President Joe Biden on Tuesday laced into the Republican Party and its presumptive presidential nominee, Mitt Romney, saying its Tea Party movement faction has blocked progress by President Obama while Romney wants to take the country back to recessionary practices. "They begin to sound like the horse that just won the Derby and the Preakness, ‘I'll Have Another,' " Biden told an audience at Keene State College. "Except the horse is a real winner. " Broadening his attack, the vice president said, "We will not go back to the '50s on social policy, to the Cold War on our...

Mitt Romney swept all the delegates in GOP primaries in Kentucky and Arkansas and picked up more endorsements from party leaders, putting him one win away from claiming the Republican nomination for president. With no serious opposition left, the former Massachusetts governor should get that win next Tuesday when voters go to the polls in Texas. Romney won all 75 delegates at stake in Tuesday's primaries. He also added endorsements from several Republican National Committee members who are automatic delegates to the party's national convention in August.

Your daily look at late-breaking news, upcoming events and the stories that will be talked about today (times EDT): 1. EGYPT HOLDS ITS FIRST FREE PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION The voting that began at 2 a.m. is the greatest prize won in last year's Arab Spring uprising that toppled Hosni Mubarak. Egyptians are choosing among 13 candidates representing both secular and Islamist paths. 2. FINANCIAL REGULATORS PROBING FACEBOOK IPO They want to find out whether the bank that handled the sale, Morgan Stanley, selectively informed clients of an analyst's negative...

WASHINGTON – Mitt Romney's campaign, following several days of intense attacks on his experience at Bain Capital, said it welcomed the discussion. "Look, we're happy to compare Governor Romney's record of success -- both at the state house in Massachusetts, and as a businessman for 25 years in the private sector -- to the lack of real world economic experience of President Obama," Eric Fehrnstrom, a senior adviser, told reporters on a conference call on Wednesday morning. He touted some of the jobs that he said were created during Romney's four-year term in...

R. Bradford Malt is best known in legal circles as the chairman of Boston's largest law firm, Ropes & Gray LLP. But last week, Malt burst into the national spotlight as the trustee responsible for overseeing Mitt Romney's vast fortune and making controversial decisions to invest some of it in a Swiss bank account and funds based in exotic locales like the Cayman Islands. Since then, the corporate attorney has spent marathon days explaining the intricacies of Romney's holdings to reporters across the country, and seen his defense of the Swiss account turned into a Democratic...

MITT ROMNEY'S real battle for female support is proving that his word is good. Based on his Bay State record, it's hard to trust him. Massachusetts is where Romney first showed his appetite for running over any candidate who stands between him and political office. Here, it happened to be women. When Romney decided to run against Ted Kennedy in 1994, Republican Janet Jeghelian, a former talk radio host, was in the race. Once Romney jumped in, he and the state GOP kept her off the primary ballot.

Mitt Romney gave President Obama a taste of his own medicine Wednesday with a new Web video featuring struggling Americans who pin their financial straits on unfulfilled economic promises by the president. In recent ads , it has been the Obama campaign spotlighting people who have lost jobs, benefits and pensions, but they have blamed Romney and Bain Capital, the private equity firm he led from 1984 to 1999. The Obama ads have been criticized, even by some Democrats, as unfair attacks on free enterprise.