Super PACs cast shadow over US primaries

DUBBED “super PACs” and flush with millions of dollars, outside groups backing and attacking Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich include a hotel magnate, a casino mogul and former partners at Romney’s private equity firm.

Political action committees are all over the airwaves in the early voting states, at times spending as much as the Republican presidential candidates themselves.

The names of these PACs — Winning Our Future and Restore Our Future, for example — do not give any clues to the average voter who is behind them. And though big money has always been a part of big elections, this year’s efforts are something new, a result of major court rulings easing spending limits by groups not directly linked to the candidates.