Mitt Romney suspends his campaign, saying he does not want to damage the Republicans' chances in the general election. John McCain addresses an audience of conservative activists in Washington DC, many of whom are hostile to his candidacy. Both Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton announce that they have raised millions of dollars in online donations since Super Tuesday.

"If this were only about me, I'd go on. But it's never been only about me. I entered this race because I love America, and because I love America, in this time of war, I feel I have to now stand aside, for our party and for our country."
Mitt Romney bows out

He ended it with honor and class Stephen Hayes, Weekly Standard on Mitt Romney At-a-glance: 6 Feb

"So, after adopting about 20 different personas over the course of the campaign, Romney has decided to leave it as John McCain. I guess that makes sense. After all, it was McCain's persona that proved to be the winning one. Too bad for Mitt that he didn't think of that earlier."
Jason Zengerle, New Republic

"Romney's opponents have complained that he ran a tough and negative campaign, and they're right. But he ended it with honor and class."
Stephen F Hayes, Weekly Standard

"There's something a little silly about Hillary Clinton's efforts to label Barack Obama 'the establishment candidate' considering that she's also bragging about her lead in superdelegates, is running on experience, and is backed by the bulk of the senior leadership cadres from her husband's administration."
Matthew Yglesias, Atlantic Monthly

"The Obama campaign all too often is about how wonderful the Obama campaign is."
Joe Klein, Time

Looking at the Intrade prediction markets can be a useful way of finding out what people think will happen in the nomination race.

Unsurprisingly, the Intrade market for the Republican contest is now showing a massive lead for John McCain, in the wake of Mitt Romney's decision to suspend his campaign. Traders now rate Mr McCain's chances of victory at 93%.

The state of the Democratic race on Intrade is perhaps more notable. For the first time since the eve of the New Hampshire primary, Barack Obama is ahead of Hillary Clinton.

Traders on the site now consider Mr Obama to have a 58% chance of winning, to Mrs Clinton's 43%.

Of course, as New Hampshire showed, the prediction markets are not always very good at predicting what will happen.

But they are a helpful guide to movements in conventional wisdom.

Mitt Romney's emotional speech announcing the end of his campaign was rapturously received by his audience of conservative activists