National Review Comes Out Against the Gingrich Gamble
National Review has a new editorial urging Republicans to settle on Mitt Romney and forego the risk of nominating Newt Gingrich. A few highlights with my emphases:
Our opposition to Gingrich, by contrast, is not based on any philosophical disagreement. Among Gingrich, Romney, and Santorum, we find only minor ideological differences. None has been a consistent small-government conservative in office; all are running on conservative, and similar, platforms this year.
…
Romney has executive experience, unlike Gingrich or Santorum, and in past elections voters have seemed to value that experience. But at least Santorum, like Romney, has been elected to statewide office before, and like Romney has shown himself able to reach beyond the Republican base in doing so. Santorum’s record in this regard beats Romney’s, since Santorum won statewide in Pennsylvania twice. Only Gingrich has never been elected to office from anything larger than a congressional district; only Gingrich has never had to reach beyond the Republican base vote to win an election.
…
Amid all the tumult of the last 18 years there has been this constant: Gingrich has never been popular. Polls have never shown more than 43 percent of the public viewing him favorably at any point in his career. Gingrich backers say that he is inspiring. What he mostly seems to inspire is opposition.
I keep coming back to this sentiment over the course of the primary, no matter which candidate I’m leaning toward: there’s much more to the political world than ideological warfare. (I said the same thing at the end of November in this longer piece critiquing a pro-Romney op/ed in the Wall Street Journal by Michael Medved. At the time my hopes were invested in Herman Cain — something that must be incomprehensible for those who assume that today only Washington establishment, big government RINOs favor Romney over alleged Tea Partier Gingrich.)
Politics is about more than Conservative vs Liberal, Right vs Left, or — as many activists choose to comprehend these terms — Good vs Evil. But the Americans who actually vote in presidential elections are hardly so Manichean. Activists who stick their heads outside of the political bubble for a moment to ask “normal” people who they’ve voted for over their lives and why will be horrified. They’ll hear superficial answers about which candidate they liked more as people. Some women might even confess they found a candidate cuter than the other. (And — not to be sexist: some men might have a thing or two to say about Sarah Palin and Michele Bachmann.)
But we’ve always known that this is the way modern presidential elections go down. Just a reminder who lost in 1960 and why:
Don’t ya know, David, that only those who support Newtonium are True Conservatives?
Kinda like only those who support RuPaul are True Conservatives.
Newtonium’s campaign has become a mockery of the Ronulans.
If popularity is going to be the standard, let’s not forget that Winston Churchhill was never very popular before becoming prime minister of Great Britain in her darkest hour.
But, to paraphrase the Wizard of Oz, Churchill had one thing that the Newtralizer doesn’t have: consistency. The reason we should shun Newt is that he’s bipolar. He might do something truly great before breakfast, then totally wreck the country after lunch. There’s really just no way to know whether the Good Newt or the Bad Newt will show up at any given moment, and we can’t afford that kind of inconsistency now.
Obama is ever the class warrior. He is consistent, more so than Mitt for sure. If consistency is the be-all, he is our man eh?
I’d like to consider any fair corrections to my take-away from this article, and here is my take-away:
(1) Not one of these candidates is very conservative. In that sense they are equal.
(2) Voters vote for candidates who charm them.
(3) Mitt is the most charming. (We are required to infer this.)
(4) We all need to support Mitt.
Do I agree with this article? Well, to agree with it is to throw one’s hands up and look to Hollywood leading men and women for candidates, no matter how librul, in future. Mutt Damon anyone [Nota bene: the U on my keyboard is not close to the A.]?
Point 2 is pretty easy to confirm or deny.
Go ask a dozen or so of your friends that don’t follow politics and blogs every day (you do have friends that aren’t political wonks, right?) why they voted for whoever they voted for in 2008.
I think you’ll be surprised at the results.
Thanks for the response.
Charm counts, a lot.
But the pocketbook counts a lot more.
McRomney will probably do as good a job as Newt would on pocketbook issues. The question is whether he will fight during the general election to make people understand the sharp contrast between him and little lenin. And the answer to that is obvious. No way.
They only way McRomney can possibly win is if the economy is much much worse in November than now. Do you want to bet on that?
So we gamble on possibly losing with Newt, or possibly winning and having a chance of getting a conservative, game-changing president.
Or we gamble on Romney and no matter who wins the general election we get a president who thinks government is the solution to all our ills.
Oh, and I *love* the implication that we should chose our candidates based on who appeals most to the shallowest and least educated.
No thanks. That’s what got us Obama.
You don’t realize it, but you just made David’s point for him.
How? By saying his point is ridiculous and insulting?
Or should I simply accept the coming totalitarian fascism because it’s what the cool kids want?
“Or should I simply accept the coming totalitarian fascism because it’s what the cool kids want?”
I believe that is the crux of the article, yes. Romney has said often that, if elected, he plans to work in harmony with the so-called Democrats now in Congress. Work with them to do what? I have no idea. Romney says he wants to work with them to get things done. What things? I don’t know.
Like-father-like-son Chris Wallace had Romney on Fox Sunday. Instead of asking Romney what he planned to do as President, Chris kept asking him about one negative charge against him after another. Romney answered with the answers he always uses. The interview was a complete waste of time. Sad.
“Oh, and I *love* the implication that we should chose our candidates based on who appeals most to the shallowest and least educated.”
This tends to usually happen with most of my Tatler posts. Someone tries to take some extreme “implication” of my argument that’s actually the not-so-subtle creation of a straw man argument that I’d never make. (Heaven forbid someone address the actual arguments made instead of skipping to their alleged “implications.”)
In a real primary there would be several candidates who meet the likability/ethics/reliability qualifier right off the bat. And there used to be before Rick Perry and Herman Cain dropped out. Now Romney is the only one left. Otherwise, I look forward to hearing the plan to reverse Gingrich’s lifetime negatives.
If this isn’t the message you wanted to get out, what was the point of your last two paragraphs? And the oh-so-helpful photographic illustration?
In a real primary there would be several candidates who meet the likability/ethics/reliability qualifier right off the bat. And there used to be before Rick Perry and Herman Cain dropped out. Now Romney is the only one left. Otherwise, I look forward to hearing the plan to reverse Gingrich’s lifetime negatives.
“In a real primary there would be …”
Hello. Earth to Swindle. This is a “real primary”.
Remember Gerald Ford? Bob Dole? GHWBush II? john Mccain? Oh wait. Those were real primaries. Were they not?
Real Primary my *ss.
You should see what I erased with my back button.
“…there’s much more to the political world than ideological warfare.”
“Politics is about more than Conservative vs Liberal, Right vs Left…”
Perhaps, but we’re so far behind on those other things that the only arena we have to make a difference in right now is political.
The left is near the end of its long march through the indoctrination institutions. They own the universities, the teachers unions, the entertainment industry and the “unbiased” “objective” “news” media. They control the national dialogue and what the population gets to read and see.
Their politicians could afford to bide their time until a critical mass of new drones had been brainwashed into believing the fantasies of St Karl of Marx, but that mass was reached in the last decade or so. Since the left took over congress in 2007 and the executive in 2009, they have shown that it is exactly about Conservative and Liberal, Left and Right.
We really can’t afford to pussyfoot around the margins anymore, and elect someone who will just be a caretaker for the Leviathan until the left wins again. It’s got to be someone with the stone huevos to take on the media and the left head-on. The only one we’ve got right now like that is Gingrich. He at least has a history of kicking Democrat butt.
This man is correct. I’m not as sure as he is about Gingrinch, but he is absolutely correct.
Really? I was under the impression that after he became Speaker of the House, the Democrats kicked his butt and drove him from elective office. The Democrats made up a semi-phony ethical case against him, forced him to pay a $300,000.00 fine (for something the IRS much later decided was legal), and drove him out of politics — Gingrich has not held any elective office from that day to this.
ummm, I think you just made the man’s point for him.
Oops.
It is my sincere belief that absent some changes, the American Experiment is, at this moment in time, on the path to failure. You guys may continue to argue about electability and “politics being the art of the possible” all you wish–I’m more concerned about the rocks and shoals I clearly see the ship approaching. It doesn’t matter whether something is “possible” or not–there is a threat, and it is going to have its say if it is not dealt with. If the good ship “America” manages to weather the lee shore, my guess it will be because the crew itself comes to recognize the danger rather than those at the helm.
So along those lines–part of the issue is fighting that which needs to be fought when it needs to be fought, so as to force the people to actually consider the issue. Some have floated the idea of Mitch Daniels as a new candidate. My personal opinion is that last year this man had a chance to show exactly what he would do if the Democrats started making excursions beyond what is acceptable. He pronounced it “part of the process”–and in so doing cut the legs out from under any who objected. For my own personal opinion, the man can stay in Indiana and continue to do whatever in the blazes it is that is so important as to necessitate continually appeasing Democrats every time they do perform yet another “will to power” move.
Watching Romney’s campaign I cannot honestly say that Gingrich is the bigger gamble.
Just another example of what a political moron Mitt is: http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/206423-romney-blasts-gingrich-over-attacks-on-debate-moderators-news-media
Saw that.
Threw up a little.
For months we’ve been told His Inevitableness is inevitable and all the rest of us needed to just
lie back and think of Englandget on board the Romney(care) juggernaut.What else have Romney’s backers lied to us about? What are they lying to us about now?
As Mr. Spengler on this site ably points out, Obama is toast. As the Washington Examiner ably points out, the ethics charges against Gingrich are utterly bogus.
This primary is picking the President.
Newt is no gamble.
The response from the Newtonians will not be pretty, David.
Although some of them are into the “looks”, rather amusingly, in trying to run down a Mitch Daniels candidacy because of his height.
Yes, that DOES surprise, I find it so shallow as to be jarring. And funny. Lots of great jokes about short people, fat people, can be made. And about people who vote on that kind of stuff. Not sure what Newtonians think about waistlines…or the show The Biggest Loser.
If appearances matter, then Romney and Santorum are the finalists. If you like sweater vests, that might tip the scales…no pun intended.
Of course, we may have forgotten what a President sounds like, having for three years (and all the campaign days prior) listened to the terminally puerile having a spitball fight with each other…and then listening to the voice of the overthrow in our ears.
Until last night. Mitch Daniels was pitch perfect for the “everyone” that the NRO guys said are important. He was, unlike Romney, not cloying, plastic, …he was comfortable in his own skin and elegant in his choice of phrasing.
THAT is what a President sounds like. THAT is how you address the key issues of the day.
Newtonian’s want explosions, because they love them. At times so do I. What they don’t care about are implosions. Or the grenade going off in his hand. Or him throwing it at the free market.
Nancy Pelosi says that she KNOWS some piece of information so earth shattering it would immediately disqualify Gingrich from the office of the President. I think she is one of the most despicable human life forms ever to have hatched. If she has “the goods” on Gingrich and it is THAT ominous…then she has a DUTY to disclose to ALL the people…now. Not just as a weapon to assist the overthrow. A DUTY. TO. DISCLOSE NOW.
If she has nothing…she should be censured and fined.
Unlike the NRO guys, I do NOT default to Romney. For all their reasons and some of my own, I do not default to Gingrich after I come to the NO position on Romney.
Romney is not capable of taking the fight forward. He’s an empty platitude automaton. He’s a prom king. Mitt Promney. He’s a wordless Mormon de Neuvillette who needs a Cyrano de Begerac to whisper words into his ear in order to woo the masses of voting Roxannes. Romney can strike all the right keys and they all still come out B flat.
That leaves Santorum. (I am in a HELL NO position on Paul)
Santorum strikes all the right keys, but somehow they all come out E above middle C sharp. He’s too strident, too shrill, too screechy for most tastes. And, for the live and let live crowd…he’s an anathema. His crossover appeal is virtually nil. For the terminally strident, that’s a plus. It’s also a sure loss in a must win situation.
I look at the landscape…and it’s funny, but I have the same feeling you get on a bad day in sports. Having fairly significant playing experience in baseball, football, golf and mixed martial arts…your bad days you see nothing but fielders at the plate, no daylight on the gridiron, nothing but trouble on the tee and nothing but hands and feet on the mat. You don’t see the openings, the gaps open to success.
That’s how I feel with this slate. My mind is assessing the best places to pick my best move…and there is nothing there. Every good option is closed.
Newtonians will throw a bucket of hate at you, the NRO, Mitch Daniels, Ann Coulter, Rush Limbaugh, Charles Krauthammer, John Hinderaker, Ace, Allahpundit, VDH, Chris Christie, Nikki Haley, John Bolton…there will be nobody left in the tent…except them and their latest hero.
Here’s the rub, however. It won’t be their fault completely. The Stupid Party gave them nobody. It has asked them to look at a “B” team squad and to try to find salvation, where there is nothing but looming disaster. How can they be blamed for grabbing onto one or the other and then pretending everything is going to be ok?
Let them pretend. The harsh light of reality will come soon enough. No sense in having them suffer for any longer period of time than is necessary.
If pretending gets them (Promneys or Newtonians) through the day from now until November, then what harm is there in it? If the Stupid Party doesn’t care, then why should they? Isn’t it time for us to simply roll over and accept one or the other?
Certainly it’s “too late” to DEMAND BETTER. In the most important election in our lifetimes. “Too late” because a late entrant can’t garner “enough” votes to “win” outright. They would have to go to the convention and secure the rest. And heaven knows…THAT isn’t going to happen anyway.
It’s “too late” to hope for a brokered convention. Because the end to this Stupid Party passion play is going to come swiftly and painlessly now….with no more damage to the free market, no more damage to the Republican brand, no more damage for the eventual candidate, no more ugly surprises.
I’m sure of it.
Aren’t you?
When did Daniels get back into the race? Last I heard, he’d said his family wasn’t interested.
I actually thought it was a good thing that Mrs Daniels let the mouse give his speech last night.
I tried to stay awake through it, but it was late in the day.
But I’m alert today and ready for some serious accounting talk!!
“Although some of them are into the “looks”, rather amusingly, in trying to run down a Mitch Daniels candidacy because of his height”
Yes we have to overlook the fact that there hasn’t been a president below average height since Van Buren. How could that possibly be meaningful? We are, after all, an equal outcome society, and one that must alway always focus on political correctness.
Thus, it was totally inappropriate to point out that Herman Cain couldn’t explain his idiotic 9 9 9 plan below the level of saying the slogan five times. That would have implied something about his intellect. So the Ruling Class had to take him out with the spurious bimbo charges. Much more politically correct in 2011 America.
And for the Mouse, even though he is about as electable as Ron Paul, we mustn’t point out the reasons why.
Except me, of course. I’ll say it. He’s too short, too bald, too boring, too much of a technocrat, and too weak. Actually, they are all connected. The Mouse would be lucky to get 40% of the vote.
btw, if the Mouse was a dynamic, heavy-hitter with big-time charisma, his height and looks wouldn’t be insurmountable. He could even overcome his mousey demeanor. But he isn’t even slightly charismatic, so he can’t win. And aside from all that, a guy who didn’t run because his wife vetoed it would be a knee-slapper in an election against the marxist machine. Sorry guys. It’s just the truth. And you all know it.
But cfbleachers is a great writer. I’m starting to view him as the Tolkien of PJM, an exceptional fantasist.
They raise some points, that Newt is not the perfect candidate.
But they seem happy to ignore Romney’s warts, inability to pull even 30% of the Republican primary vote, inability to seem authentic, unwillingness to advance conservative positions, negative of Mormonism, hysterical reaction to Newt’s win in SC, overuse of negatives in Iowa, mediocre electoral history, questionable vulture capital background at Bain, intellect 20 IQ points below Newt’s, only a couple of years younger than Newt leaving him pretty old as a candidate, fact that he basically hid in a cave for the year before the primaries instead of getting out front on issues, campaigning mostly on banalities to date trying to be elected on his looks and inoffensiveness.
And it’s that last item that is perhaps the most dangerous, he just wants to be the non-Obama. WILL THAT WORK? I doubt it.
NRO strangely ends up where they started, in the Romney bucket.
Well, let’s do a couple more primaries and see.
Romney is going to beat the current polls in Florida, we know that, because something like 1/3 of the expected votes have already been cast absentee, while Romney was leading in the polls. Which is why that should not be allowed, btw. Who’s next?
“The Stupid Party gave them nobody. It has asked them to look at a “B” team squad and to try to find salvation, where there is nothing but looming disaster.”
Hmmm. It seems to me that this is exactly the picture the MSM, the Kosiacs and Muffingtons and the host of journolisters have been trying to paint of the Repub candidates. I’m not sure it isn’t a bit overdrawn. As to the polls, they mostly paint a brighter picture of the small c communists, as you so aptly call them, than is due. Right before the election the pollsters try to get real. If they didn’t do that they would forego credibility. In other words, as always you make good points, but I don’t see as grim a picture as you do.
In honesty, however, I was foolish enough to think that a person as patently under prepared as Obama and a person such as he who believed the U.S. was so bad that he wanted to fundamentally change it could be elected President. I guess I underestimated the numbers of guilty-feeling white voters willing to overlook little flaws like those in order to prove to the world they are not racists. (A lot of good it did them eh.)
Rush has explained what the Ruling Class Republicans are up to.
They have concluded, with no evidence whatsoever, that they will lose the Senate if Newt is at the top of the ticket. And since their numero uno priority is their own welfare, they want to run McCain again, so as not to offend any liberals, who will reward them with the scraps from the lucre machine.
Rush doesn’t specifically say it, but I’ll add that Newt will take the Republican Ruling Class down. Like us, he knows they are only in it for themselves. Unlike us, he has a big-time grudge against them.
Fortunately, he is smarter than the whole lieing pack of jackels, and now that he has money from his Las Vegas angel, they can’t buy the nomination any more.
People really should look at their platforms. McRomney’s platform is eeentsy tiny nibbling around the edges of Statism. Why? Because the jackels are statists themselves. Gingrichs platform is brilliant. Just one example: his approach to fixing medicare is to offer Seniors the option of the status quo or moving to a new method. Thus, he will win a huge majority of seniors, and fix medicare at the same time. Same for taxes btw. All of the other guys offered their idiot do-it-my-way tax schemes designed to lose the maximum number of voters in the general election. Newt’s approach is “do your taxes the old way, or move to my new 15% flat tax”. Brilliant.
Romney isn’t an idiot. He’s actually a decent guy who would make a good president, but he is genetically programmed to listen to his advisers, and that team is totally committed to their own self preservation. Just like every other politician in the last 40 years except RR and Newt.
And oh yes, Newt knows how to fight and he has aligned himself to fight for regular people. All of his negative are about personal issues that nobody will care about in the general election, except the idealogues of the left and right.
Does any other poster at PJM think that there is a hidden “ruling class”, that includes virtually anyone and everyone who doesn’t sacrifice all at Newt’s altar?
It would be interesting to see just how much support is out there for this notion.
Are there people here who buy into the “the ruling class forced me to vote for Romney”? Noting a slight bit of irony at someone being “smarter than the whole lieing pack of jackels”, is this the sentiment of the Newtonians in general?
Who are these “lieing pack of jackels” anyway? That Newtonians are smarter than?
Ann Coulter, she’s voting “with her ovaries”. Ed Morrissey is a “sellout since the acquisition by Townhall”. Christie is a RINO, Nikki Haley is a one termer not worthy of our respect. The NRO guys are in the tank, Wall Street Journal are part of the “ruling class”. Krauthammer is not worth listening to anymore and the guys at Commentary, who needs them?
Ace is unworthy and Allahpundit is part of the Hot Air demise. John Hinderaker at Powerline is a fool and VDH doesn’t know what he is talking about.
So, my fellow PJM’ers…throw them ALL out of the tent.
Along with Myra Adams, David Swindle…and likely Ed Driscoll and Stephen Green, Andrew Klavan, Ron Radosh…and what should we read? Where should we go to get facts not produced by the propaganda machine on behalf of their masters, the overthrow warriors, the small c communists?
Certainly, EVERY SINGLE ONE who does not offer sacrifice to the Newtonian altar is a despised member of the “ruling class”. And we must hate…with full froth…Wall Street, private equity, and venture capitalism with equal vigor, because the all powerful Wizard “scares” guys like Chris Christie and VDH. Those guys strike you as easily scared, don’t they?
So, let’s have it, PJM’ers. Why waste time here? These authors are part of the despised “ruling class”. Why would we ever want to hang here with the likes of THEM.
I’m always flattered when two sharp minds like Conservative Wanderer and cfbleachers follow me around and shake their little fists at me.
cf has even taken to quoting me.
But I do wish he wouldn’t make up half of the quotes up.
You would think somebody as bright as he is could stick with reality…but that’s the problem isn’t it. He lives in a fantasy world.
Here is the brilliant article about the Ruling Class by Angelo Codevilla:
http://spectator.org/archives/2010/07/16/americas-ruling-class-and-the
You’re falling prey to Obama Disease, aka narcissism.
I haven’t replied to one of your comments today, except for this one right now.
How do you get your swelled head through doors?
gee, CW, what’s wrong with being in the same category as cf, the best commenter on PJM, even if he is a ruling class apologist.
You should be flattered.
Just one quick writing tip, cf.
It’s ok to write long posts once in a while, but people get bored if EVERY ONE is a long drawn out personal rant.
Shorten em up and punch em up a little bit, ok?
When he calls you snookums, sugarpie, candybritches and the like ; that’s when its time to take him seriously.
Exactly, sunshine
If you imagine you are not sounding morose, useless, and pointless in you recent posts, your nuts. Sunshine.
“Your nuts”…..sorry, who is fantasizing about what again, peaches?
NRO began losing credibility and readers in 2010 when it began demonstrate its embarrassment with the tea party folk. After the blowout elections of 2010, it tried to pretend that it didn’t find the tea partiers completely yucky (much like many of the contributors on PJM) but its been a losing battle.
Since it began its anti-Newt campaign about 2 months ago (which it wasn’t even honest enough to admit), it is in real trouble. Notice what happened to the winter fund-raising drive? Hah. Standing athwart history yelling “Sink”. Alas, the people at the helm forgot Mr. Buckley’s preference to be governed by the people the telephone book. What a pity.
For Chris’sakes.
Elect someone. Anyone. Ideological debates later.
Thanks.
Let us look at it this way; Newt has brought excitement to this election the way Cain did and Romney, even though I really like him, has not shown one ounce of enthusiasm for the fight. Really, someone needs to tell the Priebus to stand up and talk conscisley and clearly what exaclty conservatism is and help Ronmey if he is what they are standing behind. Newt on the other hand has people getting involved, which the head of the Republicans seem unwilling or too p/c to do. Remember the “Let’s fire Pelosi campaign” Steele ran? That was very successful. Let’s do a fire Obama and the media campaign. For crying out loud tell the truth and roll with it and the people will open their eyes and vote the right person in. Go after the liberal media with both barrels, and let them have it. Go on every left wing media station and just tell the damn truth.If Wasserman can spout out lies, can we not spout out some truths? We can win if all of them help all of us out to fight the good fight and win.