Comments On The Gingrich 2014-2016 Republican Strategy Memo

I posted below, without comment, the entirety of a memo from Newt Gingrich passed out as part of a briefing to Republican Congressmen and staffers in reference to the next election cycles. I would like to comment on a few of Gingrich's points here.

THE OBAMA STRATEGY FOR 2014 and 2016

It is clear President Obama has decided that he can win a decisive realignment in 2014 and then consolidate his party in power in 2016. To achieve that he will implement six specific strategies:

1. There will be a permanent 24/7 campaign to dominate the media.

That's been true for most of the past decade, ever since the far left completed their take over of the Democrat Party. The right has completely and utterly failed to match this. The rule of thumb should be simple. For every statement made by the President or a left wing congresscritter, there should be a near immediate response (within hours) made and offered to the same media outlets. Moreover, such must be concise, passionate and vociferous. Moreover, as discussed in the Horowitz column blogged above, it must be emotional. If the above does not happen, we can toss in the towel now.

3. Relentless cynicism will characterize the manipulation of facts, the choice of issues and the willingness to harm the American people and American institutions ("maximum pain for political gain" is the underlying system).

The lesson of the 2012 election is that intellectual honesty and facts are utterly meaningless to the left. Emotion will always win. We have the facts and intellectual honesty on our side, but lack virtually any emotional appeal. If you don't know what I am talking about, look to Andrew Breitbart or, for that matter, Newt Gingrich - and again, see the Horowitz column blogged above. We need emotional appeal, intellectual honesty, and an all hands on deck effort to immediately respond.

4. The entire coalition of left wing allies will be mobilized over and over to overmatchthe Republicans ( think Planned Parenthood, Sierra Club, unions, gay rights groups,etc etc).

Look at the groups Gingrich points out. Not listed are hundreds of others, the vast majority of which share a common trait - they are all funded in whole or in large part by our tax dollars. One of the major systemic problems of our form of government has been the growth, over the past four decades, of dedicated progressive groups who the left have figured out how to place on the public tit. These groups than turn around use our tax dollars to advocate for the left.

Planned Parenthood, public sector unions, Acorn and its affiliates are merely the most glaring tip of the iceberg. As to the Sierra Club and other green groups, they make a fortune suing the government under laws that allow private groups to sue under our environmental laws and to recover attorney's fees. The whole system is corrupt beyond measure. This is something the right should be attacking daily - not the least of which because many of these interest groups stand at direct odds with the victim groups the left claims to represent. The teachers unions are the single greatest millstone around the neck of blacks and, indeed, the American middle class. Radical green groups are a mortal threat to the middle class. I could go on but you get the idea. This is fertile ground that the right has not, to my knowledge, even touched upon.

FACED WITH THIS REALITY THE CURRENT GOP IS HOPELESSLY OVER-MATCHED.

FIRST STEPS:

.....

9. Including minorities is a key to success. This will be challenging, at times confusing,and fraught with frustration. Every Republican incumbent, leader and candidate should allocate one third of their time meeting with minority Americans. The first goal has to be to practice listen-learn-help-lead as a model. As Jack Kemp used to say "they have to know that you care before they care that you know". This one principle is an absolute key to any Republican hope to be a majority party.

This is one I've been screaming about for years also. The right can no longer afford to write off any demographic group - blacks in particular. Virtually every victim group the left claims to champion is screwed by them. The most egregious example was when Obama first came into office and, in response to the teacher's unions who form the financial foundation for the Democrats, Obama shut down a voucher program in DC schools that allowed some of the poorest in our Capitol to attend the same private school Obama's children attended. Obama consigned all of DC's poor - and mostly black - to the worst performing school system in the nation. Yet another example is the Lilly Ledbetter Act, something which purports to champion equal pay for women, but which would be a huge drain on the economy and hurt the employment prospects for women. The economic drain would not be because of equalizing pay, we already have laws on the books that do precisely that, but rather because it would create a class action litigation bonanza that would make employers reticent indeed to put women into any position that could possibly invite such litigation. Yet a third example is Obama's green energy madness - something which presents an existential threat to the poor and middle class as energy prices effect the price of all goods and services in our nation.

The bottom line is that we need to be going after every demographic group with a concerted effort that combines honesty and emotion. Just because they might resist the message at first is no reason not to make the effort.

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The Gingrich Election Strategy Memo

Newt Gingrich met with Republican leaders the other day to discuss their systemic problems going into the 2014 and 2016 election cycles. Someone sent Hot Air a copy of Gingrich's briefing paper. It is well worth reprinting in full. I will comment on it in future posts:

THE CURRENT SITUATION:

FEBRUARY 28,2013

Newt Gingrich

Draft

KEY PRINCIPLE:

Someone playing chess will always beat someone playing tic tac toe. Strategy beats tactics.

THE OBAMA STRATEGY FOR 2014 and 2016

It is clear President Obama has decided that he can win a decisive realignment in 2014 and then consolidate his party in power in 2016. To achieve that he will implement six specific strategies:

1. There will be a permanent 24/7 campaign to dominate the media.

2. There will be a constant issue focus shifting to topics which isolate Republicans andarouse the President's allies at the grassroots.

3. Relentless cynicism will characterize the manipulation of facts, the choice of issuesand the willingness to harm the American people and American institutions ("maximum pain for political gain" is the underlying system).

4. The entire coalition of left wing allies will be mobilized over and over to overmatchthe Republicans ( think Planned Parenthood, Sierra Club, unions, gay rights groups,etc etc).

5. The Republican Party will be relentlessly attacked and defined in extremist language ( anti-immigrant, homophobic, racist, waging war on women, etc) so the collapse and isolation of the brand makes candidates unacceptable and unelected with no regard for their personal characteristics.

6. The 2012 turnout mechanisms will be modernized, improved and strengthened to try to make 2014 turnout resemble 2012 rather than 2010.

FACED WITH THIS REALITY THE CURRENT GOP IS HOPELESSLY OVER-MATCHED.

FIRST STEPS:

1. The GOP has to admit that it is currently incapable of moving at the speed and intensity of the Obama system, with the scale of the Obama system, or with depth and technological capabilities of the Obama system. Until Republicans understand how big the gap is they will continue to lose ground.

2. A new model Republican doctrine and system has to be developed capable of matching the Obama strategy and system.

3. Virtually every element of the GOP, party leaders, incumbents, staffs, candidates,consultants, pollsters, need to be trained into the 21st century new model GOP.

4. Metrics have to be developed for measuring performance.

SOME KEY PRINCIPLES

1. The system of planning has to be:

Values
Vision
Metrics
Strategies
Projects
Tasks

2. There has to be a vision focusing on a better American future not on an anti-Obamamessage.

3. There is no red and blue. There are 311,000,000 Americans who deserve a better life than the Obama big government redistributionist model can give them. This will require an even bigger, better data system than the Obama machine built.

4. The GOP has to match or surpass the combination of data and behavioral science which the Democrats have developed since 2004.

5. Republicans have to build a system for a permanent campaign with a 24/7 strategy and media capability.

6. If you aren't on offense you are on defense. There are no time outs. Every morning you know your status. If you aren't on offense you are on defense. If you don't win the argument you won't win the vote (a Margaret Thatcher rule).

7. Republicans simply must learn to communicate effectively, emotionally and in a compelling human way.

8. Republicans have to learn to compete in the entire media culture including entertainment media and Internet based media. Republicans have to go where the voters go.

9. Including minorities is a key to success. This will be challenging, at times confusing,and fraught with frustration. Every Republican incumbent, leader and candidate should allocate one third of their time meeting with minority Americans. The first goal has to be to practice listen-learn-help-lead as a model. As Jack Kemp used to say "they have to know that you care before they care that you know". This one principle is an absolute key to any Republican hope to be a majority party.

10. This scale of change requires systematic leadership, metrics for achievement, and encouragement for those willing to take the risks, spend the energy and lead the way. It is a direction not a structure and it will inevitably have some chaotic, imperfect and even confusing moments.

11. Every Republican activist would do well to read California Lieutenant Governor (and former Mayor of San Francisco)' s new book Citizenville. While we will disagree with some parts of it, it is the best description I have found of the potential for a citizen-centric model of civil society to replace the Washington centered bureaucratic model which is currently serving a so badly.

12. Humor can be an enormous advantage, especially at a time when people are anxious about the economy, tired of the political fighting, etc. Note Reagan and Lincoln used media constantly.

Ed Morrissey ads:

Demographics are a big concern with Gingrich, and the only path to success is broadening the GOP’s brand to minority voters. “Every Republican incumbent, leader and candidate,” Gingrich advises, “should allocate one third of their time meeting with minority Americans,” and be accountable to that in measurable data. That doesn’t just mean face time, either, but a “listen-learn-help-lead” model that requires real engagement and long-term commitment to constituencies on which the GOP gave up years ago.

This isn’t new, of course; Marco Rubio and Paul Ryan have urged the Republican Party to start going back to the urban centers that Democrats have had by default for decades, and I wrote after the election about the need to provide real solutions based on conservative principles that will actually help ordinary voters in these communities and address their concerns. That’s the “listen-learn-help-lead” model; if all we ever do is the first stage, it’s not much of a mystery why we fall behind. Gingrich put this into a concrete model for the GOP to follow in his briefing yesterday, and we will see whether anyone chooses to put this into action.

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Gingrich: The Second Amendment Should Be A Universal Human Right

From Newt Gingrich in remarks to the NRA:



I concur with his remarks. Do note that as it stands now, the UN is attempting to severely limit the ability of the citizens of the world to bear arms. It is the dream of all those of a left wing authoritarian bent to disarm the citizens. It is all about control and the perfection of society.

(H/T Hot Air)

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Newt Points To Obama's "Top Five Energy Whoppers"

From Newt.org:

 “WE’RE DRILLING ALL OVER”

FALSE: “Do not tell me that we’re not drilling. We’re drilling all over this country. I guess there are a few spots where we’re not drilling. We’re not drilling in the National Mall. We’re not drilling at your house. I guess we could try to have, like, 200 oil rigs in the middle of the Chesapeake Bay.” (March 15, 2012, Prince George’s Community College.)

TRUE: President Obama has blocked drilling in offshore areas totaling more than 10 times the size of Texas. He has stalled progress on an estimated one trillion barrels of oil in the American West, where the federal government owns the majority of the world’s oil shale. These off-limits supplies alone give the United States some of the largest oil reserves in the world. And no one proposes drilling in the Chesapeake Bay.

“WE’RE USING 20%, WE HAVE 2%”

FALSE: “America uses more than 20 percent of the world’s oil. If we drilled every square inch of this country — so we went to your house and we went to the National Mall and we put up those rigs everywhere — we’d still have only 2 percent of the world’s known oil reserves. Let’s say we miss something — maybe it’s 3 percent instead of 2. We’re using 20; we have 2.” (March 15, 2012, Prince George’s Community College.)

TRUE: The President derives his “2 percent” from America’s “proven reserves,” about 20 billion barrels of oil. Proven reserves are the “quantity of energy sources estimated with reasonable certainty, from the analysis of geologic and engineering data, to be recoverable from well-established or known reservoirs with the existing equipment and under the existing operating conditions.”

 The U.S. was said to have 30 billion barrels of “proven reserves” in 1980. Yet from 1980 to 2008, we produced about 75 billion barrels of oil. No one thinks the proven reserves numbers come anywhere close to capturing our oil resources–even the U.S. government. The Energy Department estimated in 2006 that there were about 400 billion barrels of technically recoverable oil, including undiscovered resources and that does not even include oil shale. That’s 5 times the number President Obama is using. And oil shale is another 800 billion to 1 trillion barrels. Total estimated resources exceed 1.4 trillion barrels of oil in the United States, and Goldman Sachs predicted last year that the U.S. has the potential to be the world’s largest oil-producing country by 2017. The number the President is using, about 20 billion barrels, is less than the current best estimate for the Bakken formation in North Dakota alone.

In addition, the President’s claim that “we use 20% of the world’s oil” is false and evasive. We consume 20% of the world’s oil production, not 20% of the world’s oil reserves as the President’s comparison suggests. The President is just cherry-picking numbers. The 2 and the 20 are not meaningfully related so the comparison makes no sense—it certainly doesn’t prove we’re consuming too much or that there is too little to go around.

OIL IS SOLD ON THE “WORLD MARKET”…THEREFORE PRESIDENT OBAMA’S POLICIES CAN’T INFLUENCE THE PRICE OF OIL

FALSE: “How much oil we produce here at home, because we only have 2 percent and we use 20, that’s not going to set the price of gas worldwide, or here in the United States. Oil is bought and sold on the world market.” (March 7, 2012, North Carolina)

HE EMPHASIZES THIS AGAIN AND AGAIN AND AGAIN:

We can’t just allow ourselves to be held hostage to the ups and downs of the world oil market. (February 23, 2012, Miami, FL)

We’re not going to, overnight, solve the problem of world oil markets. (February 23, 2012, Miami, FL)

“Gas prices and the world oil markets right now are putting a lot of pressure on families right now.” (March 15, 2012, Prince George’s Community College.)

“When prices spike on the world market, it’s like a tax, it’s like somebody is going into your pocket.” (March 15, 2012, Prince George’s Community College.)

TRUE: President Obama and his allies have repeatedly suggested his policies can’t be blamed for high gasoline prices because oil is “bought and sold on the world market” over which he has no control. But prices on the “world market” are determined primarily by supply and demand, and the President is blocking development of substantial oil supplies offshore and in the American West, which together are several times the known reserves of Saudi Arabia. No one has claimed the President can “set” the price of oil, but his choice to close these areas affect the price significantly.

He could reverse his policies on these federal lands with the stroke of a pen. There is nothing special about the “world market” that would prevent that large increase in supply from putting downward pressure on price.

The President’s own actions have betrayed the knowledge that even marginal production changes have a significant effect on oil prices. When his administration asked Saudi Arabia to increase its own oil production, its goal was to lower prices in the U.S., and when he tapped the Strategic Reserve during the Arab Spring in 2011, he did so for the same reason. His claims to be powerless in the “world market” are just a bad excuse for the results of his anti—American-energy policies.

“TAXPAYER GIVEAWAYS” TO OIL COMPANIES

FALSE: “What’s more, at a time when big oil companies are making more money than ever before, we’re still giving them $4 billion of your tax dollars in subsidies every year.” (President’s Weekly Address, March 17, 2012)

“I don’t think oil companies need more corporate welfare. Congress should end this taxpayer giveaway.” (President’s Weekly Address, March 3, 2012)

TRUE: The oil industry is not subsidized. It is subject to generic tax deductions that apply to all U.S. manufacturers. What the President proposes is specifically targeting oil companies for tax increases, not ending subsides that are given specifically to the oil industry.

Under this view, the “giveaway” is that we are not taxing oil companies for the same things we do not tax anyone else. But not taxing an activity isn’t a “subsidy” or a “taxpayer giveaway”—unless you consider the income you’re allowed to keep a “subsidy,” too.

In addition, the President wants to end rules that prevent American companies from being double-taxed on energy they produce outside the United States, which would only benefit foreign competitors at the expense of American businesses.

The industry that is highly subsidized and receives “corporate welfare” under the Obama administration is the “green” energy industry—companies like Solyndra. The vast majority of energy sector tax preferences have been for renewables or energy efficiency companies. As the Congressional Budget Office recently reported, “Between 2009 and 2012, DOE provided an estimated $4.0 billion in subsidies for about $25 billion in loans.”

If the President is genuinely concerned about high gas prices, raising taxes on oil producers will cause gasoline prices to increase and will hurt consumers—whether he thinks that’s “fair” or not.

“SOLAR AND WIND” ARE SOLUTIONS TO HIGH GAS PRICES 

 FALSE: If we’re going to take control of our energy future and can start avoiding these annual gas price spikes that happen every year … if we’re going to avoid being at the mercy of these world events, we’ve got to have a sustained, all-of-the-above strategy that develops every available source of American energy. Yes, oil and gas, but also wind and solar and nuclear and biofuels, and more. (February 23, 2012, Miami, FL)

 TRUE: If 100% of American electricity today were generated by solar and wind technologies such as the President is pushing, it would have virtually no effect on the price of gasoline. Wind and solar are methods of generating electricity which we use to power our buildings. Gasoline is the fuel for our cars. We barely use oil at all to generate electricity, meaning that converting everything to wind and solar would do nothing to decrease the consumption of oil. The only circumstance under which the technologies President Obama mentions would be an answer to high gasoline prices is if wind and solar were economically competitive sources of electricity and we drove inexpensive electric cars with capacities comparable to conventional automobiles. But today that is a distant fantasy, not a solution.

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Another Anti-Democratic Court Outrage - The Ninth Circuit Upholds A Constitutional "Right" To Gay Marriage

Everything that is wrong with our of control court system is on display today in the Ninth Circuit Court's decision in Perry v. Schwarzenegger, upholding a lower court ruling that the will of over 7 million Californians who voted for Prop. 8 doesn't matter. Morality based on ancient Christian moral precepts doesn't matter. Gay marriage is a "constitutional right" in California.

You can find the entire opinion at Legal Insurrection.

 There is no question that at the time of the drafting of the Constitution and, 70 years later, the 14th Amendment, homosexuality was a legally proscribed practice across our nation.  Thus, using the originalist theory of Constitutional interpretation, gay marriage cannot today be recast as a Constitutional right absent an Amendment to the Constitution.  And indeed, this finding of gay marriage as a Constitutional right by the 9th Circuit is pure judicial activism, creating new rights out of whole cloth.  This is in almost every respect a replay of Roe v. Wade.

Gay marriage is a social issue raised to the fore today on the basis of changing social mores. Since it was not a right envisioned by the drafters of our Constitution and 14th Amendment, gay marriage is an issue that should be solely reserved to the states - and very much more specifically, the states' ballot boxes. This is not an issue for the Courts.

What we see in the Ninth Circuit opinion is just one more group of unelected judges who deem themselves the final arbiters of what U.S. social policy should be and who have no problem with unilaterally amending our Constitution. This despite the fact that the Constitution provides two different methods for amendment, neither of which provides for the unilateral decision of a gay district court judge or two left wing judges on the 9th Circuit Court to depart from the original intent of the drafters.

This is also one more attack on religion in this country - with the left seeking to delegitimize it and raise in its stead their own "anything goes - as long is it doesn't disagree with what we want" morality and mentality. We have seen that morality at work in just the past weeks, with the Obama administration decision to force Catholic institutions to pay for health insurance covering contraception and Plan-B abortion, and we have seen that mentality at work in the left's utterly vociferous reaction to the Komen charity's decision to stop funding Planned Parenthood.

Professor Jacobsen at Legal Insurrection summarizes the Perry court holding thusly: "since there was a prior right to samesex marriage (based on a California Supreme Court decision which gave rise to Prop. 8 ) — the taking away of that right without justification violated the 14th Amendment." So yes, the Ninth Circuit danced around affirmatively finding a right of gay marriage in the Equal Protection clause. That still does not change the fact that they should have dispensed with this case on the ground that the Equal Protection clause allows for no such right and that the will of Californians who voted for Prop 8 should be honored.

So why wasn't ancient morality derived from the Christian religion a sufficient "justification" to uphold Prop. 8. That is because, as a matter of law, Christian moral views are now deemed "irrational" and not afforded any weight.  That is a complete, judicialy imposed break with how our founding fathers saw the role of religion in America.  Compare and contrast this with the Northwest Ordinance, passed by the same people who voted to approve the First Amendment, that "Religion, morality, and knowledge being necessary to good government and the happiness of mankind, schools and the means of education shall forever be encouraged;” [and compare as well as with] early Congresses [that] proceeded to make grants of land to serve religious purposes and to fund sectarian education . . ."

At any rate, the Supreme Court led the way in severing Christian morality from our laws when they held in Lawrence v. Texas that morality is no longer a justifiable basis for our laws. If you read that case, you will see that the majority simply disagreed with the Christian morality enshrined in the Texas state law proscribing sodomy. Ironically, what they did instead was to substitute their own moral choices. It was another major marker in the advance of secularism in this country over the will of the people and another major attack on the role of Christianity in the public square.

And thus today do we have the 9th Circuit Court in Perry v. Schwarzenegger ruling that there is no rational basis for denying gays the right to marry in California.  Newt Gingrich and Andrew McCarthy have this one right.  Our courts are completely out of control.  Something must be done to restore the constitutional balance - and preferably, that something will include tar and feathers.

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Is It Time Yet For The Tea Party To Form A Third Party?

When this election season began, I felt no particular affinity for any specific candidate.  I looked forward to the Republican campaign for the nomination to shake out who was best qualified to be our President.  But that campaign has turned into an intellectually dishonest horror show that leads me to question whether the leaders of the Republican Party represent my interests as a conservative.  

As to the horror show, the story of Newt Gingrich's time in the House is ably recounted by Jeffery Lord at American Spectator. It, and the Byron York piece on the ethics complaints against Gingrich, draw an incredibly stark contrast to the screed coming out of much of the right wing punditry - NRO, Coulter, Hinderaker, etc. - and most of which you will find headlined over Drudge today. If you were to read this utterly dishonest tripe, you would think that Gingrich was a Reagan hating neo-progressive who lacked ethics above and beyond the adultery issue and who resigned from his position as Speaker of the House because of valid ethics charges.

There are many legitimate arguments for preferring Gingrich as the Republican nominee. Indeed, Thomas Sowell makes many of those arguments in his latest column. And there are many legitimate arguments for preferring Romney, particularly for the risk averse and for those comfortable with our nation as it is.  A handful of people, Charles Krauthammer, Jonah Goldberg and several others have made respectful and fair arguments in this regards.

But in the main, we are not being given honest arguments by the Republican elites. Instead, what we have been fed for months has been dishonest demagoguery and demonization of Gingrich.  And just today, that great conservative Bob Dole came out today to tell us that if we elect Gingrich, it will mean political suicide for the Republican party.  It is all nothing more or less than the same intrinsic dishonesty that we saw mirrored in the left's efforts to destroy Sarah Palin as a viable candidate and that has been aimed at delegitimizing Clarence Thomas since the day he was nominated to the Supreme Court.

And not only have the elites engaged in these disingenuous attacks, but they invariably coupled their screed with complete and utter contempt for Republican voters and the Tea Party movement especially. We are the uninformed rubes, too easily swayed by passion, unable to see reason.  We are calls for fiscal discipline are simply ridiculously unsophisticated.  It is arrogance unbound.  Apparently, it is they, not the voters, who own the Republican Party.

For the past two decades in which I have been politically informed and active, I have always believed that the single starkest difference between the left and the right was intellectual honesty. We on the right had it while those on the left dealt mostly in demagoguery and demonization. We on the right were ever willing to debate the facts, those on the left were ever willing to cherry pick the facts and use the race card or its many variants to end debate. To use the words of Bookworm Room: "Conservatives deal with facts and reach conclusions; liberals have conclusions and sell them as facts."

I see now, I have been fooled for decades. I feel nothing but disgust and utter contempt for much of the Republican Party today, and those who have held themselves out to be its champions. I think Mitt Romney, motivated by unlimited ambition, is willing to do or say anything to be elected President of the United States. Were it just him carrying on these disingenuous attacks against Gingrich and the rest of the Republican Party looking on with an objective eye, than my angst would be far less at the moment. But those who should be the party's neutral arbiters have wholly dispensed with intellectual honesty in an effort to destroy Gingrich.

So what of this?

The days of accepting the Republican Party as it is are over. It is not a party founded on intellectual honesty - and thus it is every bit as fatally flawed and destined to fail the American people as are Obama and the Democratic Party.  It is not a "conservative" party.  The reality is that, since the days of Gingrich, we have not not had a conservative option for government, we have had a choice between big D and small d Democrats.

We are in desperate need of a third party - an actual Conservative Party - founded upon intellectual honesty and dedicated to Constitutionalism, balanced budgets, a strong national defense, and doing away with the onslaught of progressivism in the social sphere. We are in desperate need of a party dedicated to making the systemic changes that would restore the Constitutional balance to our government envisioned by our Founding Fathers. The grass roots Tea Party is precisely the vehicle for such a third party.

The Tea Party was courted by Republicans in 2009 and, in the end, agreed to support them. That trust was badly misplaced. It should now be withdrawn and real consideration given to starting a third party at the grass roots level.  I say that irrespective of how the 2012 election ultimately turns out.

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Gingrich's Super-Pac $6 Million Ad Buy In Florida

This one is brutal



So what do you think, effective or ineffective? Fair or unfair?

(H/T Hot Air)

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Drudge, Crazy Nancy & Newt (Updated)

Crazy Nancy is again saying that she has something very damaging on Newt that will destroy his candidacy if Republicans are stupid enough to nominate him. And Drudge thinks this is important enough to justify the following screaming headline:

PELOSI THREAT: NEWT WON'T BE PRESIDENT

'THERE IS SOMETHING I KNOW'

The link is to the following video:

Now if Crazy Nancy actually had anything, is there any possibility at all that she would show her hand before Gingrich won the nomination? And think about what her knowledge of Gingrich was from the 90's. She was in the opposing party, a low ranker, who probably never said two words to Gingrich during his Speakership. She was part of the board that heard his ethics complaint, but he was ultimately exonerated on every one of the 84 counts. So what can she possibly have that would destroy a Gingrich bid should he become the nominee?

My guess is that the only thing that she could produce to such an effect to would be one of her old blue dresses with incriminating DNA stains.

As for Drudge, for him to run this wholly unsubstantiated claim as the lead is just incredibly unethical. I guess he is one more to add to the list of the GDS afflicted and to respond appropriately.

Update: It turns out Crazy Nancy nas no incriminating DNA evidence and knows nothing beyond what's in the public realm - but that hasn't stopped Mitt Romney from using it in a mailing today.

What a scumbag.

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The Real Story Of The Gingrich Ethics Complaints

The below article comes from Byron York at the Washington Examiner.  It is the definitive story of Newt's "disgrace," as Romney is putting it.  It is worth reading in full, for it gives the picture of just how partisan was the attack on Gingrich and just how much the MSM of the time, which then had a total monopoly on the news, hated and demonized Gingrich:

The Romney campaign has been hitting Newt Gingrich hard over the 1990s ethics case that resulted in the former Speaker being reprimanded and paying a $300,000 penalty. Before the Iowa caucuses, Romney and his supporting super PAC did serious damage to Gingrich with an ad attacking Gingrich's ethics past. Since then, Romney has made other ads and web videos focusing on the ethics matter, and at the Republican debate in Tampa Monday night, Romney said Gingrich "had to resign in disgrace."

In private conversations, Romney aides often mention the ethics case as part of their larger argument that Gingrich would be unelectable in a race against President Obama.

Given all the attention to the ethics matter, it's worth asking what actually happened back in 1995, 1996, and 1997. The Gingrich case was extraordinarily complex, intensely partisan, and driven in no small way by a personal vendetta on the part of one of Gingrich's former political opponents. It received saturation coverage in the press; a database search of major media outlets revealed more than 10,000 references to Gingrich's ethics problems during the six months leading to his reprimand. It ended with a special counsel hired by the House Ethics Committee holding Gingrich to an astonishingly strict standard of behavior, after which Gingrich in essence pled guilty to two minor offenses. Afterwards, the case was referred to the Internal Revenue Service, which conducted an exhaustive investigation into the matter. And then, after it was all over and Gingrich was out of office, the IRS concluded that Gingrich did nothing wrong. After all the struggle, Gingrich was exonerated. . . .

At the center of the controversy was a course Gingrich taught from 1993 to 1995 at two small Georgia colleges. The wide-ranging class, called "Renewing American Civilization," was conceived by Gingrich and financed by a tax-exempt organization called the Progress and Freedom Foundation. Gingrich maintained that the course was a legitimate educational enterprise; his critics contended that it had little to do with learning and was in fact a political exercise in which Gingrich abused a tax-exempt foundation to spread his own partisan message.

The Gingrich case was driven in significant part by a man named Ben Jones. An actor and recovered alcoholic who became famous for playing the dim-witted Cooter in the popular 1980s TV show The Dukes of Hazzard, Jones ran for Congress as a Democrat from Georgia in 1988. He won and served two terms. He lost his bid for re-election after re-districting in 1992, and tried again with a run against Gingrich in 1994. Jones lost decisively, and after that, it is fair to say he became obsessed with bringing Gingrich down.

Two days before Election Day 1994, with defeat in sight, Jones hand-delivered a complaint to the House ethics committee (the complaint was printed on "Ben Jones for Congress" stationery). Jones asked the committee to investigate the college course, alleging that Gingrich "fabricated a 'college course' intended, in fact, to meet certain political, not educational, objectives." Three weeks later, Jones sent the committee 450 pages of supporting documents obtained through the Georgia Open Records Act.

That was the beginning of the investigation. Stunned by their loss of control of the House -- a loss engineered by Gingrich -- House Democrats began pushing a variety of ethics complaints against the new Speaker. Jones' complaint was just what they were looking for.

There's no doubt the complaint was rooted in the intense personal animus Jones felt toward Gingrich. In 1995, I sat down with Jones for a talk about Gingrich, and without provocation, Jones simply went off on the Speaker. . . .

Jones and his partner in the Gingrich crusade, Democratic Rep. David Bonior -- they had been basketball buddies in the House gym -- pushed the case ceaselessly. Under public pressure, the Ethics Committee -- made up of equal numbers of Republicans and Democrats -- took up the case and hired an outside counsel, Washington lawyer James Cole, to conduct the investigation.

Cole developed a theory of the case in which Gingrich, looking for a way to spread his political views, came up with the idea of creating a college course and then devised a way to use a tax-exempt foundation to pay the bills. "The idea to develop the message and disseminate it for partisan political use came first," Cole told the Ethics Committee. "The use of the [the Progress and Freedom Foundation] came second as a source of funding." Thus, Cole concluded, the course was "motivated, at least in part, by political goals." Cole argued that even a hint of a political motive, was enough to taint the tax-exempt project, "regardless of the number or importance of truly exempt purposes that are present."

Cole did not argue that the case was not educational. It plainly was. But Cole suggested that the standard for determining wrongdoing was whether any unclean intent lurked in the heart of the creator of the course, even if it was unquestionably educational.

Meanwhile, Democrats kept pushing to raise the stakes against Gingrich. "Anyone who has engaged in seven years of tax fraud to further his own personal and political benefits is not deserving of the speakership," Bonior said just before Christmas 1996. "Mr. Gingrich has engaged in a pattern of tax fraud, lies, and cover-ups in paving his road to the second highest office in the land…I would expect the Justice Department, the FBI, a grand jury, and other appropriate entities to investigate."

With the charges against Gingrich megaphoned in the press, Gingrich and Republicans were under intense pressure to end the ordeal. In January, 1997, Gingrich agreed to make a limited confession of wrongdoing in which he pleaded guilty to the previously unknown offense of failing to seek sufficiently detailed advice from a tax lawyer before proceeding with the course. (Gingrich had in fact sought advice from two such lawyers in relation to the course.) Gingrich also admitted that he had provided "inaccurate, incomplete, and unreliable" information to Ethics Committee investigators. That "inaccurate" information was Gingrich's contention that the course was not political -- a claim Cole and the committee did not accept, but the IRS later would.

In return for those admissions, the House reprimanded Gingrich and levied an unprecedented $300,000 fine. The size of the penalty was not so much about the misdeed itself but the fact that the Speaker was involved in it.

Why did Gingrich admit wrongdoing? "The atmosphere at the time was so rancorous, partisan, and personal that everyone, including Newt, was desperately seeking a way to end the whole thing," Gingrich attorney Jan Baran told me in 1999. "He was admitting to whatever he could to get the case over with."

It was a huge victory for Democrats. They had deeply wounded the Speaker. But they hadn't brought him down. So, as Bonior suggested, they sought to push law enforcement to begin a criminal investigation of Gingrich.

Nothing happened with the Justice Department and the FBI, but the IRS began an investigation that would stretch over three years. Unlike many in Congress -- and journalists, too -- IRS investigators obtained tapes and transcripts of each session during the two years the course was taught at Kennesaw State College in Georgia, as well as videotapes of the third year of the course, taught at nearby Reinhardt College. IRS officials examined every word Gingrich spoke in every class; before investigating the financing and administration of the course, they first sought to determine whether it was in fact educational and whether it served to the political benefit of Gingrich, his political organization, GOPAC, or the Republican Party as a whole. They then carefully examined the role of the Progress and Freedom Foundation and how it related to Gingrich's political network.

In the end, in 1999, the IRS released a densely written, highly detailed 74-page report. The course was, in fact, educational, the IRS said. "The overwhelming number of positions advocated in the course were very broad in nature and often more applicable to individual behavior or behavioral changes in society as a whole than to any 'political' action," investigators wrote. "For example, the lecture on quality was much more directly applicable to individual behavior than political action and would be difficult to attempt to categorize in political terms. Another example is the lecture on personal strength where again the focus was on individual behavior. In fact, this lecture placed some focus on the personal strength of individual Democrats who likely would not agree with Mr. Gingrich on his political views expressed in forums outside his Renewing American Civilization course teaching. Even in the lectures that had a partial focus on broadly defined changes in political activity, such as less government and government regulation, there was also a strong emphasis on changes in personal behavior and non-political changes in society as a whole."

The IRS also checked out the evaluations written by students who completed the course. The overwhelming majority of students, according to the report, believed that Gingrich knew his material, was an interesting speaker, and was open to alternate points of view. None seemed to perceive a particular political message. "Most students," the IRS noted, "said that they would apply the course material to improve their own lives in such areas as family, friendships, career, and citizenship."

The IRS concluded the course simply was not political. "The central problem in arguing that the Progress and Freedom Foundation provided more than incidental private benefit to Mr. Gingrich, GOPAC, and other Republican entities," the IRS wrote, "was that the content of the 'Renewing American Civilization' course was educational...and not biased toward any of those who were supposed to be benefited."

The bottom line: Gingrich acted properly and violated no laws. There was no tax fraud scheme. Of course, by that time, Gingrich was out of office, widely presumed to be guilty of something, and his career in politics was (seemingly) over.

Back in January 1997, the day after Cole presented his damning report to the Ethics Committee, the Washington Post's front-page banner headline was "Gingrich Actions 'Intentional' or 'Reckless'; Counsel Concludes That Speaker's Course Funding Was 'Clear Violation' of Tax Laws." That same day, the New York Times ran eleven stories on the Gingrich matter, four of them on the front page (one inside story was headlined, "Report Describes How Gingrich Used Taxpayers' Money for Partisan Politics"). On television, Dan Rather began the CBS Evening News by telling viewers that "only now is the evidence of Newt Gingrich's ethics violations and tax problems being disclosed in detail."

The story was much different when Gingrich was exonerated. The Washington Post ran a brief story on page five. The Times ran an equally brief story on page 23. And the evening newscasts of CBS, NBC, and ABC -- which together had devoted hours of coverage to the question of Gingrich's ethics -- did not report the story at all. Not a word. . . . .

All of which leads to the question, just how ethical is Romney's attack on Gingrich?

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WSJ Goes Into Full GDS Meltdown

Gingrich Derangement Syndrome is causing a complete melt-down among many of the Republican elite, but few can match the meltdown we see on the pages of the WSJ today from Brent Stephens.  I will not link to this piece of excreta.

Mr. Stephen's has become so overwrought at Gingrich's victory in South Carolina - and Romney's weaknesses exposed - that it has led him to pronounce that "Republicans deserve to lose."  As to those idiot voters in S.C., Mr. Stephen's has this to say:

That's my theory for why South Carolina gave Newt Gingrich his big primary win on Saturday: Voters instinctively prefer the idea of an entertaining Newt-Obama contest—the aspiring Caesar versus the failed Redeemer—over a dreary Mitt-Obama one. The problem is that voters also know that Gaius Gingrich is liable to deliver his prime-time speeches in purple toga while holding tight to darling Messalina's—sorry, Callista's—bejeweled fingers. A primary ballot for Mr. Gingrich is a vote for an entertaining election, not a Republican in the White House.

The arrogance and the disdain just drip from the pen of Mr. Stephens.  God forbid that we, the voters who actually own the Republican Party, should think contrary to him.  To the extent that Mr. Stephens requires some reminding of that fact, let's cue up the appropriate non-verbal response.

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Fred Thompson Endorses Newt Gingrich

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Florida Republican Debate 1.0

Tonight's debate, hosted by NBC, was the first of two debates before Floridians pull out the canes and the walkers and venture out into the January chill to vote. There were no real highlights.

Out of the gate, Romny went on the attack, throwing every bit of mud he could at Gingrich, hoping that some of it would stick. He came off as angry and shrill. Gingrich refused to take the bait, staying composed. As to how that plays overall, we will have to wait to see the new polls to tell.

That said, I think Romney made a huge mistake by trying to dredge every bit of mud he could find rather than concentrate on just the worst of it all - including that he went a step too far in the attacks. Romney concluded his attack by criticizing Gingrich's support of Medicare Part D while taking money for advising pharmaceutical firms. Gingrich pounced, embracing Medicare and Medicare Part D and that he was shocked (just shocked I say) that Romney would criticize him (or the millions of elderly Floridians on Medicare) for his  support of Medicare Part D. That was not a highlight reel, but I bet it plays with a lot of registered reporters in Florida.

 The slipperiest answer of the night was from Newt, whose full support of the ethanol mandate is unconscionable. Part of the ethanol program includes large supports for Florida sugar cane farmers. Newt gave a long non-answer, bring up beet root sugar and other farm subsidies, concluding that all subsidies should be taken away, but that removing agriculture subsidies is almost in the 'too hard to do' column.

A question was brought up on the Dream Act. Romney, weeks prior to the debate, said that he would veto it.  Many thought this was going to hurt Romney in Florida, with its large latino population.  When Gingrich was asked in the debate whether he too would veto the act, he said no, that he would keep that portion of the Dream Act that would allow illegals who join our military to get citizenship through that route - which is actually a long term policy of the U.S.  Romney quickly jumped in out of turn, obviously realizing the error of his ways, and said that he agreed with Gingrich.

What really struck me, at the end of debate, was the fact that Romney still doesn't have a good narrative as to why he should be President. He was asked, "[This] is a battle for the soul of the Republican Party. What have you done to further the cause of Conservativism as a Republican leader?" Romney response was anything but a cogent and stirring call to arms. He started off by talking about being a father and grandfather. He then tried to play up his private sector experience, but didn't make any of the points he could have as to why that makes him the best Presidential choice.

One of the things that was blatantly obvious during the debate is that Gingrich is courting Ron Paul in domestic policy areas. Indeed, the only thing that didn't happen on the stage was Gingrich passing folded love notes over to Paul, who in fact repeatedly had eyes for Gingrich. It was a bit stomach churning. Truly, if I was Caliska, and given Newt's history, I'd be worried.

Santorum gave good answers to the few questions thrown his way.  Ron Paul sounded sane and sage tonight.  I don't think it will help either too much.

In sum, I don't know whether tonight's debate will stop Gingrich's momentum.  Gingrich may have helped himself a little with his answers on the Dream Act and Medicare.  Let's see the polls.

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Gingrich, Communications & The GDS-Suffering Republican Elites

. . . for years now, I have been screaming that the failure to communicate and respond to these endless [leftwing] attacks was the greatest failing of the Bush Administration - and Republicans generally in all situations. I am convinced that McCain lost the election because of his failure to aggressively attack Obama in the debates and the failure of the entire Republican Party as a whole to respond to the left's outrageous charge that the right was responsible for our financial nightmare. . . .

Having watched the current crop of Congressional Republicans for years now, I am under no illusion that, come 2012, they will be able to effectively communicate. The backlash we see against Obama's policies and vast overreach today has come from the bottom up, with the Tea Parties and social networking. It has nothing whatsoever to do with Congressional Republicans. That does not bode well for the right come 2012.

That said, as I look out at the field of potential candidates who could possibly communicate effectively - those with the necessary intelligence and aggressiveness to actually call the left on their falsehoods and change our national paradigm - the only one I see today who foots that bill is Newt Gingrich. . . .

16 July 2010, Wolf Howling, Looking Ahead: Obama, 2012 & The Biggest Republican Weakness

Gingrich won South Carolina by 12 points and, going into Florida, he now leads the polling by 9 points. Hysterical dysentery has now afflicted those many Republican elites suffering full blown cases of GDS (Gingrich Derangement Syndrome). The disdain they feel for the voters - i.e., the rank and file Republicans and independents who voted in the S.C. primary - and the grass roots Tea Party movement literally drips from their mouths. It appears that before the Conservative rank and file can take back our nation from Obama, we will first have to take back our party from the Republican elites.

As so many people are today pointing out - Gingrich roars. And when he unapologetically does so with passion and eloquence in defense of conservative values, when he does so in shredding an ill thrown race card, when he does so in calling the media out for their bias, that is what the base of the party wants above all else. It is clear that the base understands that it is precisely what the party has been lacking. And it is clear that the base also understands that progressives - who have, over the past century, changed our nation in so many ways - will continue making fundamental changes to our nation until we can get someone who roars in defense of conservative values.

This is not a sudden catharsis, at least for me. I have been pointing it out as the single greatest failing of Republicans almost from the first day I started this blog. For but a few examples, see:

-  Advice On How To Lose The 2012 Election
-  Looking Ahead:  Obama, 2012 & The Biggest Republican Weakness
-  A New Cold War In America
-  Losing the Message Wars
- Republicans Ponder The Abyss

For the past eight decades, Republicans in government, with the exceptions of Ronald Reagan and then Newt Gingrich, have been fighting a rear guard action, accomplishing little more than minimizing the ever continuing advance of socialism / progressivism in our government and in our society.  As to Reagan as President and Gingrich as Speaker, they actually pushed back against the advance and managed conservative victories.  They did so because they vocally, passionately and eloquently were able to challenge the falsehoods of the left while promoting conservative ideals.

We can see much the same happening today in some of the states. Take New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie for example.  He is a darling of the right today - despite the fact that he is a RINO's RINO on so many conservative issues.  But on the two intertwined issues most effecting NJ, the economy and the power of unions, Christie is firmly on the conservative side of the fence.  And he has been just a shining success in bluest of blue NJ on those issues.  Why?  Because he is an incredibly effective communicator who is vocal, passionate and eloquent in the effort to promote fiscal sanity and an end to the power of NJ's massive public sector unions.

But today, the many Republican elites suffering GDS are telling us that the ability to communicate does not matter and that the voters in S.C. were just dumb.  They now are trying to frighten the base into voting for Romeny by saying that a Gingich nomination will mean that we lose not just the Presidency, but the House and the Senate down ticket.  Let's take a look:

The voters in their infinite wisdom have just given a huge boost to perhaps the only GOP candidate who could shift the spotlight from President Obama to himself, alienate virtually all independent voters, lose more than 40 states and put the House majority in jeopardy.

Jennifer Rubin, The Washington Post

. . .  with Newt Gingrich you get the name calling for the president — very popular with the tea party crowd in South Carolina, not so popular with independents. He won’t put a fence on the border and wants amnesty for illegals. He took $1.6 million from Freddie Mac. But you know, he attacked Paul Ryan’s plan on Social Security. So with Newt Gingrich, you throw out the baby and keep the bath water… I think South Carolina is going back to their Democratic roots.”

Ann Coulter, Fox and Friends (via Gateway Pundit)

. . . Let’s just pray that Barack Obama’s second term didn’t start today. If Gingrich does get the nomination, this may turn out to be a year in which Republicans more or less ignore the presidential race, ceding Obama his second term, and focus instead on trying to hold the House and, if possible, picking up a seat or two in the Senate, along with doing the best we can in state races where the wipeout at the presidential level doesn’t swamp all efforts to elect Republicans.

John Hinderaker, Powerline

On the heels of Newt Gingrich’s trouncing of Mitt Romney in the South Carolina primary, Republican Party brass are privately expressing deep concerns that former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich’s high unfavorable rating in national polls could prove catastrophic to the so-called “down ballot”–the House and Senate races under the presidential race–and may even threaten the Republican Party’s control of the House of Representatives.

GOP strategist Steve Schmidt, who previously served as Sen. John McCain’s senior campaign strategist, told MSNBC commentator Rachel Maddow that if Mr. Gingrich wins next week’s Florida GOP primary, there will be “a panic and a meltdown of the Republican establishment that is beyond my ability to articulate in the English language. People will go crazy.”

Wynton Hall reporting at Big Government

What these GDS-afflicted prophets of Armageddon are relying upon are polls showing that, at the moment, Gingrich has a lot of negative name recognition. Wow, no kidding? It's not like Gingrich suffers from two liabilities - the MSM of the past two decades and now the GDS afflicted right.

Does anyone reading this remember Gingrich's speakership in the mid - 90's, the balanced budgets, the welfare reform, the Contract With America, the good economy, the low jobless rate? I do. And I vividly remember a few other things. The left of the era hated Gingrich with a passion that would not be seen in America again until Sarah Palin came onto the national scene. The MSM of the time was not just as left wing as today, but they had a near complete monopoly on the news. There was no alternative media. They demonized and demagogued Gingrich unmercifully. Indeed, I kid you not when I say I remember the day I looked up the definition of the word "demagoguery" in the dictionary. I had heard the word used by Rush Limbaugh in an interview with the Speaker in response to how the left and the entire MSM was portraying one of his acts.

Update: It appears that my memory of that time - the intense partisan war against Gingrich, the bull shit ethics complaint, and the total war of the MSM declared on Gingrich is accurate. Byron York of the Washington Examiner takes us on a walk back through that time here.

As to when Republican members in the House led a coup against Gingrich, I have no inside knowledge. I do know this. What we got after Gingrich left was a disaster. We got a House that was, for the next decade, nothing more or less than Democrat-lite. There were zero conservative accomplishments, there were zero balanced budgets, but there were huge increases in spending. So was the problem Gingrich's leadership, or the fact that Gingrich took Republicans out of their comfort zone and brought a lot of bad press at the time? I have always believed it was the latter based on what I saw at the time and afterwards.

And now when it comes to negative press, it has been the GDS Republican elites who have picked up where the far left MSM dropped off near a decade ago. As I wrote in Decemeber:

The last two months of flame throwing against Gingrich [by the GDS-afflicted Republican elites] has left me wondering whether we can yet pull defeat from the jaws of victory. Precious little of what is coming from the right leaning pundits has been reasoned criticism. To the contrary, its largely been overheated hyperbole of the ilk used by the left to demonize and delegitimize Sarah Palin.

So when the GDS afflicted right now tells us that a Gingrich nomination would be catastrophe because he doesn't have positive name recognition, that is like the boy who murders his parents then asks the Court for mercy because he is an orphan.

So how are we to evaluate Gingrich's negative name recognition from some earlier national polls when matched up with the most recent polls and with the results of the SC election? First this from Gallup:

The latest Gallup polling shows Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney each trailing President Obama by exactly the same tally — 50 to 48 percent. . . .

. . . Gingrich, in particular, improved versus Obama in the swing states: While he trailed Obama by 6 points overall at that time, he led Obama by 3 points in states that are likely to be hotly contested — a swing of 9 points.

The Gallup poll is not limited Republicans, and it certainly seems that Gingrich is at least as popular as Romney. And then there was the S.C. open primary, where Gingrich not only won running away, but also took the independents.  I am just not feeling the hate . . .

In sum, all of prophecies of total Republican annihilation coming from Republican elites who hold the actual voters in utter disdain is nothing more than fearmongering. Their total immersion in GDS suggests that their problems with Gingrich run far deeper than merely wanting to see the Republican party - or conservativism, for that matter - succeed, and their total disdain for the Republican base shows arrogance unbound. Indeed, it leaves me speechless, though still with a desire to communicate clearly with the GDS-afflicted Republican elites. That said, let's cue the non-verbal response.

Update:  Doug Ross has also addressed the down-ticket argument with a rather amazing historical fact from Rasmussen. You literally have to go back in time to 1860 to see a scenario play out where an incumbent president loses the White House but his party wins "control of either house of Congress from the other party."

Update:  Linked at Larwyn's Linx.

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The Prophecy Of Gingrich Aide Rick Tyler

In May, 2011, the pundits pronounced Newt Gingrich's candidacy, not merely dead, but in an advanced state of decomposition. Oh, ye of little faith! This from Fox documents the Gingrich candidacy memorial service presided over by Charles Krauthammer and attended by Juan Williams.



After the death certificate was delivered to Gingrich campaign H.Q, Gingrich aide Rick Tyler penned a press release so ridiculous, so over the top, that Stephen Colbert brought in John Lithgow to give it a dramatic reading on his show.

Lithgow does Newt (on Colbert) from wally danger on Vimeo.

In case you missed any of it, here is the body of Tyler's oft ridiculed press release:

The literati sent out their minions to do their bidding. Washington cannot tolerate threats from outsiders who might disrupt their comfortable world. The firefight started when the cowardly sensed weakness. They fired timidly at first, then the sheep not wanting to be dropped from the establishment's cocktail party invite list unloaded their entire clip, firing without taking aim their distortions and falsehoods. Now they are left exposed by their bylines and handles. But surely they had killed him off. This is the way it always worked. A lesser person could not have survived the first few minutes of the onslaught. But out of the billowing smoke and dust of tweets and trivia emerged Gingrich, once again ready to lead those who won't be intimated by the political elite and are ready to take on the challenges America faces.

And as rdbrewer writes at Ace of Spades today;

That was all very funny at the time. At the time. Well, what did happen in South Carolina? Out of the billowing smoke and dust of tweets and trivia emerged Gingrich, once again ready to lead those who won't be intimidated by the political elite and are ready to take on the challenges America faces!

Now I'm wondering who this political mastermind is. How could he have foreseen such a result? Does he travel through time? Can he get me some winning lottery numbers? And I'm thinking it looks like we all owe him an apology.

Heh. So let it be written. So let it be done.

(H/T Nice Deb)

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GDS Humor

I can't stand the screeching of the GDS (Gingrich Derangement Syndrome) crowd. But I do appreciate their humor when its well done.

(H/T American Digest)

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Gingrich Derangement Syndrome

While Bush Derangement Syndrome only effected those on the left, the right now has its own analog, Gingrich Derangement Syndrome. GDS apparently afflicts select right wing pundits, most everyone at NRO, and John Hinderaker at Powerline:

So, congratulations to Newt, and on to Florida. Let’s just pray that Barack Obama’s second term didn’t start today. If Gingrich does get the nomination, this may turn out to be a year in which Republicans more or less ignore the presidential race, ceding Obama his second term, and focus instead on trying to hold the House and, if possible, picking up a seat or two in the Senate, along with doing the best we can in state races where the wipeout at the presidential level doesn’t swamp all efforts to elect Republicans.

Now that is a full blown case of GDS.

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Lessons From South Carolina

. . . Newt Gingrich’s rise has a lot to do with Newt Gingrich’s debate performance. But it has just as much to do with a party base in revolt against its thought and party leaders in Washington, DC. The base is revolting because they swept the GOP back into relevance in Washington just under two years ago and they have been thanked with contempt ever since.

Adding insult to injury, the party and thought leaders now try to foist on the base a milquetoast moderate from Massachusetts. Newt Gingrich can thank Mitt Romney and more for the second look he is getting. Base hostility will now be exacerbated by Mitt Romney’s backers now undoubtedly making a conscious effort to prop up Rick Santorum to shut down Newt Gingrich. . . .

People are mad as hell they are about to be stuck with another boring, moderate, uninspiring choice that has at best a 50/50 shot at losing to the worst president since Carter. They are flocking to Newt not because they think he’s a great guy, but because right now, he’s the only one fighting for conservatism and GOP voters are looking for a vessel to channel their anger with Obama and their complete disappointment with the GOP establishment which is now embodied perfectly by Romney. They want a conservative fighter because most conservatives look back at Ford, Reagan, Bush, Dole, Bush, and McCain and see only the ones taking a conservative path against the Democrats actually winning.

Eric Erickson, Newt Gingrich Wins. What It Means. Red State, 21 Jan. 2012

Newt Gingrich just won the South Carolina primary running away, 40% to Romney's 28%. The exit polls explaining Gingrich's win are a gold mine of data for both Gingrich and Romney going forward.

Gingrich:

The exit polls, shown here and excerpted in relevant part in the post below, show that Newt won virtually every demographic and on virtually every major issue. He won across all income levels, including blue collar and white collar types. The numbers show what are Gingrich's winning messages.

Jobs and the Economy:

This was the big issue from the exit polls - critical to 63% of the voters, and Gingrich beat Romney among those voters by 8 points. I found that surprising. What it says is that the electorate responded to Newt's economic experience while in Congress more so than they trusted Romney to be able to translate his business experience into a successful economic plan.

Given the centrality of this issue and the success Gingrich has had with it, Gingrich needs to make this issue number one going forward, not just on the stump, but in a majority of advertisements. He needs to emphasize, at every opportunity, the fact that government does not create jobs, the private sector does. The mission of government is to create a positive playing field for business - and in that, he can legitimately claim that his incredibly successful experience at the federal level is far more significant than Romney's as governor, and of a different nature all together than Romney's private sector experience.

Budget Deficit:

This issue was central to 22% of the voters, and Gingrich crushed Romney among these voters, 45% to 23%. Obviously the fact that Gingrich actually balanced the federal budget during his Speakership weighed heavily on that issue. That said, Romney has pointed out that he balanced the budget as Governor of Massachusetts. What Romney neglects to say - and that Gingrich should be bringing up - is that Mass. law requires a balanced budget. Romney is taking credit for doing nothing more than complying with the law. Gingrich's achievement while as a Speaker was orders of magnitude tougher - a point Gingrich should emphasize.

On The Morality Issues:

Deeply religious and conservative South Carolina has put to rest any questions about whether Gingrich's past moral failings are going to be a drain on him. They aren't. Gingrich captured the vote of women generally (38% to 29%) and of married individuals (41% to 28%) in SC. Moreover, he captured as much of the evangelical vote (44%) as Gov. Huckabee did when he ran in SC in 2008.

Electability:

On the issue of electability, the 45% of SC voters who voted in light of that issue judged Gingrich more electable versus Obama than Romney by 51% to 37%. It seems clear that their decision was based on the debates and Gingrich's willingness to, one, eloquently and passionately burn the race card while defending conservative values (Juan Williams), and two, to take on the press for their bias (John King).

Listening to Fox News tonight, the talking heads who oppose a Gingrich nomination are taking the position that debate performances will matter very little in the general election. In essence, just because Newt is such an effective communicator and defender of conservative values, it has little to do with electability. That is patently false.

Gingrich needs to address this for two reasons. One, this is his single greatest strength. As Eric Erickson notes in the passage quoted at the top of the page, conservatives more than anything else are hungering for a person who can do what Gingrich does. Two, Newt needs to push back against this meme that his communication skills matter only a little. To the contrary, they matter tremendously.

John McCain lost the 2008 election because he ceded the major issues to the Obama narrative. Outrageously, over half the nation still thinks that the subprime crisis was caused by Wall St. greed. Bush failed to reform Social Security because the left was able to demagogue the issue. The Bush presidency was crippled because of Bush's failure to directly challenge the left's despicable campaign to loose the Iraq war. The base understands this. The ability to communicate may well be the single most important skill for any conservative nominee for President today. As Erickson says, look back at Ford, Reagan, Bush, Dole, Bush, and McCain, the only ones who have won have been those that unapologetically and vocally embraced conservativism. Newt needs to emphasize precisely that.

Independents

Self-identified independents broke for Gingrich 31% to 25%. It would seem that he doesn't have anywhere near the problem with independents that his critics would like us to believe. There is no real lesson here other than keep doing what he is doing.

Going Negative On Bain

The majority of voters in S.C., 64%, had a positive view of Romney's experience as a venture capitalist with Bain and, of those people, they broke almost evenly between between Gingrich and Romney. As to the 24% of Republicans that had a negative view of Romney's experience as a 'vulture capitalist,' 50% went for Gingrich, 3% went to Romney. Thus it would seem that Newt's going negative on Bain did make a real difference.

That said, I wonder how much of a backlash there may well be later in the campaign if Gingrich keeps up this attack on Bain and, by extension, capitalism. Gingrich has enough strengths, as mentioned above, that he really should lay off the Bain issue.

What Gingrich Can Expect Going Forward

Gingrich has been the subject of the most concerted internal effort to destroy a Republican candidate since Barry Goldwater in 1964. With this huge Gingrich win in SC, expect the floodgates to open, making the left's efforts to demonize and delegitimize Sarah Palin in 2008 look like a measured effort in intellectual honesty. This is going to get real ugly real quick. Let's hope that Newt can withstand the inferno in the kitchen.

There is still at least one area in which Newt has yet to be truly pressed and which he needs to be fully prepared to address - the fact that he lost his speakership to a coup after three years. He needs to be prepared to answer that in the upcoming weeks.

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Mitt Romney

Romney collapsed in South Carolina over two issues. One, his horrid answers when asked about releasing his tax returns. He became not merely defensive, but stuttering and rambling over the issue. Clearly he has some worries over this. But the old adage is true - bad news does not improve with age. He needs to release his tax documents immediately or this is an issue that is just going to haunt him.

Two, Romney's campaign can best be described as defend and coast. He has clearly failed to make the case for his candidacy. Claiming divine right to the nomination based on "electability," he has played a defense to this point - just say the right platitudes and bromides and avoid mistakes. For example, for months Romney refused to appear on television talk shows - at least until it became clear that he would face a real challenge from Gingrich.

In probably the most telling example, both Romney and Gingrich have been presented with what they thought were unfair questions from the press. When Bret Baer asked Romney a question he thought unfair, Romney answered it with a forced smile, then waited for the interview to end before coming back to Baer and expressing his displeasure. When Gingrich was asked an unfair question by John King, in full view of the public, he took out a knife, emasculated King and then nailed his testicles to the podium before asking for the next question. Romney needs to quickly figure out that his acts earned the scorn of the base, while Gingrich's earned him a standing ovation and 40% of the vote in South Carolina.

The Economy & Jobs

Romney has been relying on the bald fact of his experience in business to claim that he could best manage the economy. While that by itself might be a winning message against Obama, it did not work in SC against Gingrich, who was part of one of the biggest expansions of jobs in our nation's history. Romney needs to explain why his experience in business would at least make him the equal of Gingrich. A few anecdotes might do the trick. Regardless, if he can't win on this issue, he has deeply serious problems.

Budget Deficit:

Romney is loosing to Gingrich by 22% on this issue. Romney needs to do a much better job articulating how he will reduce the deficit than he is doing. The program he proposes on his website is far more complicated than what Gingrich has proposed, yet Mitt hasn't made a simple, convincing case as to why his plan is more likely to succeed.

Electability

Romney needs to stop claiming inevitability and electability and start concentrating on all of the issues that undergird such claims. Indeed, any such claims in the wake of South Carolina will just be engender laughter.

Going Negative On Gingrich

The problem with hitting somebody unfairly is that, when they can, they strike back. Gingrich didn't have the funding or time to withstand a multi-million dollar negative assault in Iowa. He did in South Carolina and, though he was outspent by Romney 2 to 1, ran away with the primary. Going negative did not work for Romney in 2008, it likely won't work now with Gingrich having the financial muscle to punch back. Romney is going to have to become much more aggressive in explaining why he would make the best President rather than concentrating on why Gingrich shouldn't be.

Going Forward

This election is still Romney's to lose. He has a superior organization built up over four years, he has the largest war chest, and he is not merely the favorite son of Republican elites, but these same elites suffer full blown Gingrich Derangement Syndrome. The next several contests are in areas favorable to Romney, from Florida to Nevada. Nonetheless, if he continues to play defense and expects the nomination to be handed to him, he could yet pull defeat from the jaws of victory. He needs to start earning the nomination.

As to Ron Paul, he came in last place with 13% of the vote.  He is staying in the race just so he can impact on the plank of the Republican Convention. Santorum, who earned 17% of the vote, is in the race at least through Florida, though another low showing will likely see him exiting the race just because of a lack of funds. That is, he would be forced out unless some of Romney's money men prop him up to keep in the race and draining votes from Gingrich. I would not be overly surprised to see that.

Linked:  Larwyn's Linx

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And The Winner Is . . . Newt Gingrich - Including Among Women, Independents & Those Voting On Electability

The polls are closed in South Carolina and the last kazoo has sounded. Fox projected the winner of the South Carolina Republican primary to be Newt Gingrich as soon as the polls ended. Update: The final tally is Gingrich 41%, Romney 27%, Santorum 17%, Paul 13%.

Just the fact of Gingrich's win puts a huge dent in the aura of inevitability Mitt Romney has attempted to paint since the start of the race. But it is the exit polls that are truly eye opening.

According to conventional wisdom, Romney is best suited to beat Obama, Gingrich is toast among women voters because of his past affairs, and Gingrich can't appeal to independent voters. The exit polls shred the conventional wisdom and, given that Gingrich won in virtually every possible demographic, ought to be giving the Romney camp nightmares.  This from the exit polls:

Women  voters:  Gingrich 38%, Romney 29%

Independents:  Gingrich 31%, Romney 25%

Very Conservative:  Gingrich 47%, Romney 19%

Somewhat Conservative:  Gingrich 41%, Romney 30%

Moderate to Liberal:  Gingrich 31%, Romney 34%

Age 18-29:  Gingrich 27%, Romney 16%

Age 30-44:  Gingrich 37%, Romney 19%

Age 35-64:  Gingrich 40%, Romney 28%

Age 65 and up:  Gingrich 47%, Romney 36%

Evangelicals:  Gingrich 45%, Romney 25%

Tea Party Supporters:  Gingrich 45%, Romney 25%

Income less than $50k:  Gingrich 40%, Romney 24%

Income $50k to $100k:  Gingrich 40%, Romney 24%

Income over $100k:  Gingrich 38%, Romney 34%

With a College Degree:  Gingrich 37%, Romney 31%

Without a College Degree:  Gingrich 42%, Romney 24%

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Issues that mattered most:

Abortion:  Gingrich 27%, Romney 6%

Budget Deficit:  Gingrich 44%, Romney 23%

Economy:  Gingrich 40%, Romney 32%

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Candidate Can Beat Barack Obama: Gingrich 51%, Romney 37%

Candidate is a True Conservative:  Gingrich 37%, Romney 2%

Candidate Has The Right Experience:  Gingrich 49%, Romney 34%

Candidate Has Strong Moral Character:  Gingrich 6%, Romney 19%

It is of note that Romney came into the SC primary with a 16 point lead ten days ago. He also outspent Gingrich by at least two to one on advertising in South Carolina. And yet . . .
 
Check back. I will be updating this post with an analysis of the issues Gingrich's victory raises tonight in the run for the Republican Presidential nomination.

A quick parting thought. How would you like to own the Malox concession near NRO headquarters at the moment. And a parting question, who do you think is drinking more scotch or popping more valium tonight, George Will, John Hinderaker, Jennifer Rubin, Ann Coulter or Kathleen Parker?

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SC Debate 2.0

The two big moments of the debate belonged to Newt Gingrich. For a second time in two debates, Newt got a standing O. Tonight's was in response to the first question of the night, when the CNN moderator John King asked Newt to respond to his ex-wife's allegations that 14 years ago, he asked her to engage in an open marriage. It has got to be a candidate for the ultimate debate smackdown - perhaps now as pithy as "I knew Jack Kennedy, and you, sir, are no Jack Kennedy or as brilliantly humorous as "I will not hold my opponents youth and inexperience against him" - but equally as devastating.



The second big moment for Newt - probably in my eyes but few others' - was proof that he actually may know when to shut up. I don't have the video, but will post it when I can find it. The moderator asked Gingrich in essence to justify the charges in a recent mailing regarding Romney's weak kneed history on abortion. Gingrich did so, pointing out things that Romney had done that favored abortion after Romney's Paul of Tarsus moment on the issue. Romney responded in a huff, at which point the moderator went back to Gingrich for a counter rebuttal. Gingrich's response: "I cede my time to Governor Santorum." Heh. It was a pitch perfect moment, allowing Santorum to do all of the dirty work of really attacking Romney on the issue.

The candidates traded barbs all night, none of which I thought were too devestating. That said, the low point of the evening was yet another self inflicted wound by Romney, when he was heckled for trying to tap dance around why he didn't release his tax records in advance of the SC primary vote.



From Hot Air: "Exit quotation from Jonah Goldberg: “Romney can’t answer questions about his tax returns at all… He’s terrible at it and he needs to get better, quickly.”

The general feeling of the few sites I looked at was that Gingrich won the debate (here, here, here). We will see if SC agrees on Saturday.

I will say in conclusion that Newt was just ever so slightly off his game tonight, at least after the first question. In particular, he missed some real opportunities to make his case more forcefully. The one that struck me most was when Santorum accused Newt of grandiosity, implying that Newt would be too impractical to be President. Gingrich fended it off, but what he should have pointed out are that the problems facing the U.S. are themselves grand in stature today. Our regulatory bureaucracy - built up over 100 years - has become an anti-democratic nightmare that threatens the whole economy.  It needs to be reformed completely.  Our debt is about to choke us and the welfare state is going to bankrupt our country in the foreseeable future. Obamacare, Obama's war on energy, and the fact that the left has the keys to the courthouse on all environmental issues threaten the very foundation of our nation. The Arab Spring is turning into a nightmare throughout the Middle East, and there is Iran, playing the role of Germany circa 1937. Small solutions that move the bar just a bit are not going to solve these problems. But alas, Gingrich only alluded to that. It was one of several missed opportunities.

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