Former Massachussets governor Mitt Romney, trailing badly in the national polls and with time running out, has tapped his inner attack dog and has started to lay into his rivals with a gusto not seen in GOP presidential politics in a while.

On Romney's website, Mitt tries to make the case that Republican front runner Rudy Giuliani is actually a liberal out of the Hillary Clinton mold. In fact, Romney compares the positions of Giuliani and Clinton and sees many similarities on gay marriage and abortion. He also points out when given the opportunity to label Clinton a "liberal," Giuliani declined, saying instead that he was a "liberal too."

How this kind of attack will play out given Romney's own problems as the governor of a liberal state whose positions on some issues have taken a decided swing to the right remains to be seen.

Meanwhile, Romney also went after his closest competitor in Iowa, Mike Huckabee:

"He may be conservative on social issues, but when it comes to economic issues like immigration, he's a liberal on immigration. He fought for tuition breaks for illegal aliens. He raised taxes time and time again as governor of Arkansas," Romney told CNN.

Romney has long been the frontrunner in Republican polls in Iowa, but surveys in the past two weeks indicate that Huckabee has closed the gap with the former Massachusetts governor. With just six weeks before the first contest of the 2008 presidential race, both men have draped themselves in the mantle of former President Ronald Reagan.

"I must admit that I find the vision and the direction that Ronald Reagan laid out for this country to be very powerful and very compelling," Romney said. "And I'll tell you, Ronald Reagan would have never raised taxes like Mike Huckabee did.