Mitt Romney

In the last days before Thursday's Iowa caucuses, Mike Huckabee, lacking money and staff, is adopting a freewheeling and inexpensive strategy of asymmetrical political warfare -- inviting reporters to a pheasant hunt, a morning jog and a haircut -- to needle his better-funded, better-organized challenger, Mitt Romney.

It's not just Mike Huckabee's top rival in the Republican race who is responsible for attack ads that have damaged his candidacy in the closing days of the Iowa campaign. Huckabee has been the target of a $550,000 campaign waged by the conservative anti-tax Club for Growth. An Arkansas man who is responsible for a separate low-budget hit vowed Monday to take his anti-Huckabee campaign to South Carolina, which holds its GOP primary Jan. 19.

Two days before the New Hampshire primary that could make or break his White House candidacy, a combative Mitt Romney quarreled with rivals John McCain and Mike Huckabee over taxes, crime and job experience in a testy Republican debate that exposed growing animosity among the candidates. Romney's attacks set off a cascade of counter-assaults on the former Massachusetts governor, who has placed enormous stakes on winning here but has slid behind McCain in the polls.

No letup in the last hours After Iowa, change is in the air in New Hampshire. In the Democratic primary, Barack Obama's emphasis on change has suddenly made him the candidate to beat. On the Republican side, Mike Huckabee has a tall order in replicating his win, but this has forced Mitt Romney to alter his tactics and helped revive John McCain's chances.

When Mitt Romney and his advisors plotted a path to the Republican presidential nomination, they figured they had superior fundraising, organization and discipline. All they needed was momentum, and that would come, they presumed, with early victories in Iowa and New Hampshire.

Reeling from defeats in New Hampshire and Iowa, Mitt Romney suspended TV advertising in South Carolina and Florida on Wednesday, a money-saving move that laid bare the dire condition of his run for the White House. After a year of sparing virtually no expense in his quest for the Republican nomination, Romney's pullback amounted to an extraordinary retreat in two states that will hold crucial primaries this month -- even though he could resume advertising on short notice.

Republican presidential candidates, losing the fundraising advantage their party has enjoyed for decades, are starting to feel the pinch. Tight for cash, Mitt Romney has pulled television advertising in two key states. Rudolph W. Giuliani has cut his payroll and moved staff from states that he is writing off. Even Mike Huckabee, winner of the GOP Iowa caucuses, has fallen short of his fundraising goals.

Appealing to voters anxious about an unraveling economy, Mitt Romney scored a decisive victory in the Michigan primary Tuesday, setting up a free-for-all among the leading Republican presidential candidates in this weekend's pivotal party contest in South Carolina. Romney's clinching of a long-sought electoral "gold medal" after disappointing silver trophies in the Iowa and the New Hampshire contests revived a richly funded campaign that appeared to be teetering on collapse.

Republican Mitt Romney said Thursday he could govern in the country's best interest because "I don't have lobbyists running my campaign." But Washington insiders are on his senior staff and registered lobbyists are top advisors. One advisor, Ron Kaufman, chairman of Washington-based Dutko Worldwide, regularly sits across the aisle from Romney on his campaign plane, participates in debate strategy sessions and last week accompanied Romney to a lunch in Myrtle Beach, S.C., with Sen.