A pair of conservative groups founded with the help of Republican political guru Karl Rove raised more than $70 million since their inception last spring, making them the undisputed leaders of an onslaught of outside spending during the 2010 midterm campaign, according to new disclosures Thursday.

American Crossroads, a "super PAC" that can raise and spend as much money as it wants, took in nearly $28 million in donations, weighted heavily with large contributions from financiers, oil tycoons and other wealthy individuals, according to filings with the Federal Election Commission.

It's official. The drug industry's chief lobbyists — the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America — raised and spent at least $101.2 million in 2009 on advocacy efforts during the contentious health care overhaul debate, according to tax documents the group filed last month.

Former PhRMA CEO Billy Tauzin tells Shots the lobby used the money — special contributions from member companies — for broadcast and print ads, grassroots and direct lobbying, polling and consulting. Tauzin, who has a two-year contract to advise PhRMA's new leader, recently opened his own DC-based lobbying shop with his son Tom.

If the Obama administration was hoping to see hints of bipartisanship from the Hill, it might want to skip over the House Energy and Commerce Committee.

The committee's ranking Republican, Rep. Joe L. Barton (Tex.), has a slide presentation that he's e-mailing to colleagues, pledging to do for the administration what Gen. George Patton and company did for Germany. The first slides are standard campaign material, with Barton asking to be elected by the new House Republican majority to be chairman of the committee.

The governor-turned-reality-TV-star’s new book dives into feminist history—distorting and misunderstanding it every step of the way. In some ways, it’s a good thing that Sarah Palin calls herself a feminist. It means that, even among conservatives, women’s equality has become a normative position, the starting point for debate.

It means that feminism has gone from something that the right wants to destroy to something it wants to appropriate. That’s progress, of a sort.