I was fortunate enough to attend a reasonably small gathering at the Peninsula Hotel in Beverly Hills last night to meet Governor Romney and hear him speak. First impressions — his charm is immediately evident. He’s very energetic and connects to the audience naturally and comfortably. He’s funnier than I expected (though he opened with a crowd-pleasing joke that might well be from the Vaudeville era) and clearly a very, very smart man. His sell last night was equal parts CEO-President and Reaganesque rugged-leader-in-troubled-times. Someone asked him about Reagan, and he responded that he reads a lot of history, including the recent Teddy Roosevelt bio-volumes. The Governor practically gushed — “What a guy! What a guy!” And then he went on of course to call Reagan one of his heroes. There was nary a mention of any values-voter type questions, which is not surprising given the locale. I have to say I was pretty taken with the guy, though I confess to still being largely undecided about an ‘08 candidate.