This is the Cato Daily Podcast for Tuesday, January 10th, 2012.

I'm Caleb Brown.

Super PACs have earned the ire of candidate Newt Gingrich,

just as a super PAC that supports him, is about to launch an expensive

attack on the presidential aspirations of Mitt Romney.

But says the Cato Institute's John Samples, super PACs aren't just about political attack ads, they're about freedom of political

speech.

I think you predicted this a while ago, this idea that at some point candidates would be asked to reject the attacks that were coming out of not

affiliated but not

control,

control in any way, but can't encourage others

to contribute to and otherwise play essentially no role in the operation of the organization.

Newt Gingrich recently asked Mitt Romney to reject the characterizations made in ads that were produced by a Romney

supporting Super PAC.

So where does that, where does all that stand right now?

Well, as what happens usually is that the independent super PACs do something that the

candidate finds embarrassing or is receiving bad press about and then they reject them or ask them publicly to stop it.

That does not, Mitt Romney did not, as far as I know say anything about withdrawing which he can't really do legally

but even rejecting as a general public matter the criticisms of Newt Gingrich that

were advanced by a super PAC that's favorable to him.

And indeed, you know, I think for all of these candidates to have done that would be a tremendous

mistake for our we have elections not just to

...