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Brokaw issued a statement (buttressed by one from NBC News) urging that the ad be pulled, but the campaign refused, drawing a weekend’s worth of attention to the charges uttered by one of the most respected names in the news business -- an added bit of irony given the mileage Gingrich has gotten from his biting attacks on the media.

Along with those media blitzes, Romney’s established organization here has helped blunt the grass-roots momentum Gingrich drew from his victory in South Carolina. Yard signs promoting the former Massachusetts governor are everywhere in this state, even hundreds of miles from where his events have been held. Gingrich signs are harder to come by.

The same is true for Rick Santorum, who was forced to leave the campaign trail over the weekend. He had already planned to go home to Pennsylvania to release his tax returns, but his campaign announced Saturday night that his daughter Isabella had been hospitalized back home, meaning Santorum had to break from campaigning early for family reasons.

Gingrich and Santorum have been keeping fuller schedules than Romney since the campaigns descended on the Sunshine State. But a full schedule didn’t help Romney back in his 2008 quest for the nomination, so the campaign didn’t replicate that model this time. Instead, it has tailored events to key industries and demographic groups. In Panama City, hundreds of voters gathered at a shipbuilding facility to hear the candidate talk of job creation and his desire to increase the number of ships deployed by the Navy.

Gingrich’s packed schedule has created complications for the campaign: Some stops have been dropped at the last minute, and he showed up to an Orlando event more than an hour late on Saturday.

And now, just four days after he was leading Romney in a pair of polls, surveys show Gingrich may be headed for a decisive loss to his chief rival.

Nevertheless, Gingrich has been defiant and maintains he will keep running all the way to the convention. He pointed out that if his support is combined with Santorum’s, one of them will be able to overcome Romney.

But Santorum has no plans to abandon the race any time soon; his campaign advised late Sunday that the candidate will campaign in Missouri and Minnesota on Monday, and in Colorado and Nevada on Tuesday.

But Santorum, who is not calling to upend the tax code, as the other candidates have done, also doesn’t fit the Tea Party mold. And he too spent time in Senate leadership before losing his seat in 2006.

Ron Paul has faded from view here, campaigning instead in Maine, and his support in the polls has dropped. After finishing with more than a fifth of the vote in Iowa, he’s pulling only a tenth in Florida polling.

The establishment has done major damage to the current and former Washington lawmakers who hoped to gain Tea Party support. It remains to be seen, though, whether the wind is fully out of the Tea Party’s sails. If Ron Paul were to stage a third-party run, it could be re-energized.