Romney vs. Paul

National Public Radio is doing a fun little online game, running a GOP 2012 Presidential nominating contest through NCAA Tournament-like brackets. They started with 32 candidates, and are now in the second round.

Mitt Romney, who was given a number one seed, is in big trouble -- he has come up against Ron Paul in this round, and those Ron Paul fans, they do love themselves some Internet.

With just a couple of days left for voting, Romney is getting slaughtered nearly to-to-one, in a contest with by far the most voting action -- more than 100,000 votes.

My dark-horse candidate, Mike Pence -- who I initially ranked #3 but have since dropped to #4 in my own rankings -- will be eliminated by Sarah Palin in this round, but is holding his own at around 40%, considering the difference in name recognition. Another of my big underdog picks, Jim DeMint, is pulling an upset over Mike Huckabee. My top two, Mark Sanford and Tim Pawlenty, appear headed to the final 8 as well, with Pawlenty currently ahead of Newt Gingrich. My #5, John Thune, got knocked off in the first round.