Pawlenty's VVS speech

Tim Pawlenty delivered his address to the Values Voter Summit tonight.

He started with a bio, then moved onto religious freedom, abortion, and gay marriage, which marked the onset of a tougher, but still somewhat affected guttural tone.

After that, he jumped into the economic arena, hitting cash for clunkers, constitutional issues, spending, missile defense, debt issues, and the DNC's hits on him (He said he accepts their challenge).

He ended with an anecdote about Ronald Reagan and an appeal for the country to return to its spiritual values.

(As an aside, how did Ronald Reagan ever get elected President in 1980 without being able to invoke his own memory in a speech?)

In essence, Pawlenty did the sandwich thing: started friendly, got tough, ended friendly. And while it was as pointed in tone as most anything he's done, George C. Scott he was not; more like John C. Reilly in Chicago -- there were things to get mad about for Amos Hart near the end, but his anger couldn't quite overcome his kindness.

Romney's tomorrow. So is the straw poll.......