Mitt Romney's 'power grab' may lead to a convention floor fight

The about-to-be-nominated and the guy he's shutting out of the process. Republicans have fallen in line behind Mitt Romney, but even so, there's a rebellion brewing against some of his efforts to consolidate control of the Republican National Convention. Rule changes pushed through by Romney's campaign would allow presidential nominees to refuse specific convention delegates elected at the state level. In other words, Romney is having fits over the threat of Ron Paul delegates making some noise and decided the rules should change to prevent that. The spectacle of Paul making a 67-minute speech to an adoring audience of 7,000 in Tampa on Sunday is unlikely to soften Romney's resolve to shut him out of the process.

What passes for a grassroots uprising within the Republican party is being led by what Buzzfeed's Zeke Miller characterizes as "key figures in the conservative movement and on the committee" including "Virginia delegate and longtime RNC member Morton Blackwell, a former Reagan aide who founded a conservative training academy called the Leadership Institute." Some of these blades of grass look suspiciously like trees, in other words.

According to Blackwell, "These rule changes are the most awful I've ever seen come before any National Convention."

"This is the biggest power grab in the history of the Republican Party because it shifts the power to select delegates from the state party to the candidate," said Indiana National Committeeman Jim Bopp in an email to RNC members late Sunday, calling it an "overreaction" to Ron Paul. "And it would make the Republican Party a top down, not bottom up party."

Organizers are trying to force a roll call on "minority report" amendment to the Rules Committee report; to get the roll call they must have majority support from six state delegations. As you might imagine, the Romney campaign will be putting considerable pressure on delegates to prevent this from ever coming to a vote.