A new Marist Poll puts Pawlenty at the back of the pack of likely 2012 GOP contenders. Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney led the field with support from 21 percent of those polled, while just trailing were former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin (20 percent) and former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee (19 percent). Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich drew support from 10 percent of those surveyed, while Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal was the top pick of five percent of respondents. Pawlenty’s draw: just one percent.

Photo: MN North Star

If Gov. Tim Pawlenty’s office still uses those “While You Were Out” notes, his Monday-morning stack would make interesting reading. During his weekend trip to Iraq, Pawlenty was called a GOP “star” like Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, and his name came up in speculation about which unnamed governor was reportedly also serviced by one of former New York Gov. Elliot Spitzer’s sex providers.

A hooker identified only as “Annie” told the New York Daily News that besides Spitzer (and Bernie Madoff) she counted another, unnamed governor among her customers. That led Gawker to speculate that it could be Pawlenty.

City Pages insists one detail — a “prominent” wife — nixes T-Paw from the list of possible candidates. But hey, Mary Pawlenty used to be a judge (before a brief stint at an arbitration outfit that Attorney General Lori Swanson just forced out of the arbitration business). Gov. Pawlenty also frequently deems his wife “hot,” although he once said he’d have it made “if I could only get her to have sex with me.” 

Photo: US Army

More flattering was the pronouncement by Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour, himself a 2012 presidential prospect, that the Republican Party’s future lies with “stars” like Pawlenty and Jindal (not to mention Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, who Barbour called “a bona fide energy expert”).

Pawlenty and Jindal haven’t been mentioned in the same breath as often since Jindal’s lackluster GOP response to President Obama’s State of the Union address. But Jindal is fixing to make his star rise again this week by blitzing op-ed pages and the cable-news talk show circuit.

Barbour made the comment at the annual meeting of the National Governors Association, which Pawlenty used to chair. This year, Pawlenty skipped the guvconfab (as well as his Friday radio show) for a trip to Iraq with three other governors.

It was planned as a morale-booster for the troops but turned solemn due to the deaths of three Minnesota National Guard military policemen – Spc. Daniel Paul Drevnick, 22, of Woodbury, Spc. David Wertish, 20, of Olivia, and Spc. Carlos E. Wilcox, 27, of Cottage Grove — just days before.

According to the Red Bull Report:

“Normally, at these town hall meetings, we talk about a lot of stuff,” said Pawlenty, “from the GI Bill to the Minnesota Vikings. But I want to limit my comments today to letting you know that I’m just so very sorry.”

When the time came for the MPs to ask questions of the governor, the room was silent for a moment. One Soldier stood up, who would ask the one and only question from the entire company. The Soldier was Staff Sgt. Blake Hayden from Woodbury, Minn., squad leader for the Military Police Company’s Quick Reaction Force and the direct supervisor of Drevnick, Wertish and Wilcox.

“Sir, are you going to be able to be at the funerals?”

The governor did not mince words with his response.

“Yes.”

Pawlenty has almost promised to travel to Puerto Rico next month as a special guest at a fundraiser for the Republican Governors Association. That’s an organization his fan Barbour now heads, after South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford resigned the post following his own sex scandal.

“Sign me up for your Tea Party, patriots,” she said in a video message. “God bless you and keep up the great work!”

While Bachmann lent her full support for the movement, Republican Reps. Erik Paulsen and John Kline remained silent on the tea parties.

Local organizers decided to forgo speeches by elected officials but didn’t shun words of endorsement.

“Although we had many requests, we did not want any elected officials to speak at this event,” Tea Party organizer Margaret Lee said in a press release.

When Gov. Tim Pawlenty gave the RNC Weekly Republican Response last weekend, he didn’t mention the Tea Party to be held right outside his office a few days later. Other speculative Republican presidential nominees ran with the Tea Party cause, however, including Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford, Kansas Sen. Sam Brownback and Texas Gov. Rick Perry, who all showed up at their local gatherings.

Some elected officials were cautious about the Tea Party. “I’m just thinking what I should say because it can be used against me in a court of law,” Rep. Jim Abeler, R-Anoka, joked to the Star Tribune.

While Minnesota’s organizers left Republican leaders out the mix from the get-go, their presence at other rallies left a bad impression, the Washington Independent reports. Jason Pye, a libertarian organizer in Atlanta, Ga., was not pleased when Newt Gingrich became involved.

“Newt Gingrich enabled George W. Bush,” Pye told the Washington Independent. “He enabled the big spending. He lobbied conservative Republicans to compromise their principles and support Medicare Part D. He supported the bailout.”

In fact, a number of signs at the St. Paul rally served to remind tea party attendees that Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas, “was right” and that mainstream Republicans were late to the party.

Bachmann’s message to Tea Party-goers:

Appearing on NBC’s “Meet the Press” today, McCain expressed “admiration” for his 2008 vice presidential pick but listed Pawlenty when host David Gregory asked him about future Republican presidential prospects.

GREGORY: In terms of future leaders of the Republican party, would you like to see Sarah Palin become president?

McCAIN: I’d like to see her compete. I think we’ve got some very good candidates. (Utah Gov.) John Huntsman and — the problem when I run down these names I always leave out a name — (Lousiana Gov.) Bobby Jindal, Tim Pawlenty. There’s so many. There’s a lot of good, fresh talent out there.

GERGORY: Would you support Palin?

McCAIN: Oh, I’d have to see who the candidates are and what the situation is at the time. But have no doubt of my respect, admiration and love for Sarah and her family.

The exchange was a virtual replay of remarks McCain made on ABC’s “This Week” in December, just weeks after the election, when he joked “my corpse is still warm.”

That suggests that developments since then — including Jindal’s widely panned Republican response to President Obama’s address to Congress and Pawlenty’s poor straw-poll showing at a conservative confab — haven’t discouraged McCain about the future of those two 2008 GOP veepstakes also-rans.

Asked today how the Republican Party can avoid permanent minority status, McCain listed several approaches: “Party of ideas, party of inclusiveness, outreach to other ethnic aspects of the American electorate.

“A lot of people complain about divisions within the Republican Party,” McCain said. “That’s good right now. Let’s let a thousand flowers bloom.”

(If embedded video does not appear above, see the “Meet the Press” clip here.)

Palin is sending back 45 percent of the $930 million her state had coming — $160 million of which would have gone to educating people in a state where 40 percent drop out of high school. Maybe some of it could have been spent on sex ed: Alaska’s teen pregnancy rate is the fastest-growing in the land. But no, Palin insisted that any money she took fit her requirements to a T: ”timely, targeted and temporary.”

Oh, for the wisdom of Solomon! Wait — was Solomon a maverick or a community organizer? No matter — spurning half the federal government’s largesse to Alaska isn’t really like splitting the baby. For a GOP governor with lofty ambitions, it’s more like being half pregnant.

The winner of the straw poll was former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, garnering 20 percent of the vote. He was followed by Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal (14 percent), Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin (13 percent), Texas Rep. Ron Paul (13 percent) and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (10 percent).

Of the 10 contenders on the ballot, Pawlenty outpaced only Florida Gov. Charlie Crist, who’s become a heretical figure in the GOP for supporting the $787 billion stimulus package.

In another shocking CPAC polling development, Rush Limbaugh was voted the most popular media personality by participants, taking 26 percent of the vote. He easily outpaced Glenn Beck (17 percent), Sean Hannity (11 percent) and Bill O’Reilly (10 percent).

H/T: The Plank

It’s no secret that Pawlenty is looking to higher office, and the makeup of the Republican candidate pool might make his decision to forgo another run for governor in 2010, a seat he has never won by a majority. Will Jindal’s statement put ideas in his head?

2. Tim Pawlenty: After being edged out in the veepstakes, T-Paw’s profile faded somewhat over the final few months of the presidential campaign. But, the reasons he was an attractive potential vice presidential pick — two-term governor of a swing state, up-from-the-bootstraps personal story, an economic populist by nature — also are those that make him an appealing blueprint for Republicans around the country to copy. Watch to see if Pawlenty emerges as a leading economic voice for the party over the coming months; if he does, expect him to be a candidate when 2012 rolls around.

Of course Pawlenty will face a dilemma about how to continue boosting his national reputation over the next two years before the presidential sweepstakes starts to crank back up. Most significantly, does he run for re-election in 2010?