[Toughy]

http://www.npr.org/webapp#1001/146099697

Study: SuperPACs Behind Nearly Half Of 2012 Ads
By Peter Overby
January 30, 2012
All Things Considered [ 3 min. 47 sec. ]

A new analysis shows that in the deluge of TV ads in the early voting states for the Republican presidential primaries, nearly half of the ads are coming not from the candidates but from superPACs — the new breed of political committees that raise unregulated money.

Political scientists at Wesleyan University in Connecticut found that so far, there have been about the same number of GOP primary ads as there were four years ago.

What's different — and different in a big way — is the role of outside money groups, mostly superPACs, says Erika Franklin Fowler, a director of the Wesleyan Media Project. "They went from about 3 percent of total ad airings in the 2008 race to almost half, about 44 percent, in 2012," she says. <snip>