Four years after he announced at the Conservative Political Action Conference that he was quitting the 2008 Republican presidential race, Mitt Romney returns to CPAC this week a battered but resilient front-runner for the 2012 GOP presidential nomination who is still struggling to win over conservatives.
The three-day CPAC confab in Washington represents a crucial opportunity for Romney, who won just three of eight state nominating contests so far because so many Republicans still fret that he's too moderate and malleable on issues of importance to them. It's also an unusual moment for CPAC. The Republican nominee is usually known by the time the group convenes, but this year's race is still in flux, which will only intensify competition for those conservative activists.
