Biggest loser in Pennsylvania primary isn't Santorum

That sniffling sound you hear is not Rick Santorum's supporters bemoaning his decision to pull the plug on his presidential campaign but the managers of forty-six Keystone State television stations counting the ad dollars they have lost.

So far this year, the race for the Republican presidential nomination has brought a bonanza of ad dollars to broadcasters in states that have played host to early contests, the more so because of the rise of super PACs, political action committees that can raise and spend money in unlimited amounts in support of -- or opposition to -- candidates for office. Spending in Pennsylvania had only begun to ramp up in advance of the much anticipated April 24 primary featuring Santorum, who represented the state for 16 years in Congress, and GOP frontrunner Mitt Romney. The biggest ticket item on Sunlight’s tracker so far: $153,000 in media buys by the pro-Romney super PAC Restore Our Future for ads in opposition to Santorum. But local station managers had to be licking their chops at reports that Romney was planning to launch a multi-million-dollar ad war to finish Santorum off.