Dear Brother Newt

A friend of mine is closely related to a U.S. Senator and the stories I get to hear are very interesting sometimes. Though as much as Senator ______ interests me, I couldn't imagine the horrors of the Gingrich family. The once mighty Speaker of the House is trying to increase his power in the Republican party yet again but his sister has some choice words for her dastardly brother. Candace is a proud liberal, gay and not afraid to tell her big brother that the world isn't about the hatred and fear that he helps to provoke.

From The Huffington Post:

Dear Newt,

I recently had the displeasure of watching you bash the protestors of the Prop 8 marriage ban to Bill O'Reilly on FOX News. I must say, after years of watching you build your career by stirring up the fears and prejudices of the far right, I feel compelled to use the words of your idol, Ronald Reagan, "There you go, again."

However, I realize that you may have been a little preoccupied lately with planning your resurrection as the savior of your party, so I thought I would fill you in on a few important developments you might have overlooked.

The truth is that you're living in a world that no longer exists. I, along with millions of Americans, clearly see the world the way it as -- and we embrace what it can be. You, on the other hand, seem incapable of looking for new ideas or moving beyond what worked in the past.

Exactly, and so are many in his party. They are sticking to the success of their "Contract with/on America" years ago and refuse to wake up to how most Americans are looking at the state of their nation in 2008. As Candace points out to her brother, the change isn't going to stop, no matter how much fear and ignorance is used to prop up their litany of bogeymen. So skipping over the part of how great the progressive movement, I'd like to highlight Candace's simple piece of advice for Newt.

What really worries me is that you are always willing to use LGBT Americans as political weapons to further your ambitions. That's really so '90s, Newt. In this day and age, it's embarrassing to watch you talk like that. You should be more afraid of the new political climate in America, because, there is no place for you in it.

In other words, stop being a hater, big bro.

That is precisely what Newt is, a hater, nothing more, nothing less.

Is Newt Trying To Re-Take The GOP?

A couple of pundit/well to do Washingtonians (Mike Barnicle and Andrea Mitchell-Greenspan) have been hearing whispers around the capitol that yesterday's lack of leadership in the Republican caucus was the result of Newt Gingrich. Why would Gincgrich do such a thing? Perhaps to cap McCain's faltering campaign in the knees and run for President in four years. Of course after hearing the chatter, Gingrich quickly berated them, raising suspicions even higher.

From ThinkProgress:

.....Speaking at the National Press Club today, Gingrich denied Mitchell’s claim, saying MSNBC is wrong and probably “deliberately wrong” because its a “stunningly dishonest network.” “I was reluctantly helping it get through,” he said.

Even throughout yesterday, Gingrich’s position was nearly impossible to pin down. On Glenn Beck’s radio show, he admitted, “I’m not sure if I were in the Congress I could vote against it” while also declaring that Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson “should be fired” and that the bailout plan “is still a bad bill.” On Fox News last night, he seemed to praise the House’s rejection of the bill: “The vote today indicated that even when they’d worked for five days to try to improve what was really a pretty terrible original plan that [Paulson] sent up, it still couldn’t get a majority in the House.”

Apparently, Gingrich was against the bailout before he was for it — before he was against it again.

Gingrich is staying extra slimy throughout this situation and it raises the possibility that he wants to bring about a full circle in the GOP. The vehement denial by someone of his stature means that we should all watch out for a resurgent Gingrich. Of course, that would be absolutely hilarious, since it was his reckless behavior that ultimately screwed Republicans out of power two years ago. People are tired of his brand of thuggery (along with the rest of the GOP) and desire leadership in these trying times, not cheap political tricks. Now with that said, if he wants to help divide up what's left of the Republican caucus, then by all means, go right ahead.

Newt Is Still An Idiot

Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich must think that Sean Hannity's audience is pretty damn stupid. Do they really believe all the lies that Hannity and his guests tell them? Well probably, but some things are just too hard to swallow. One of those untruthful stones was force-fed last night on the Fox News show.

From ThinkProgress:

Last night on Fox News, host Sean Hannity and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-GA) returned (as they often do) to Sen. Barack Obama’s (D-IL) recent suggestion that Americans inflate their tires properly in order to save energy costs.

Seeming to outdo his previous false attacks on this issue, Gingrich claimed that Obama’s idea is actually encouraging Americans to “enrich Big Oil” because selling air has “a higher profit margin than selling gasoline”:

GINGRICH: Well, I got a very funny e-mail from a retired military officer in Tampa who pointed out that most tire inflation is done at service stations and you pay for it. And it’s actually a higher profit margin than selling gasoline. So Sen. Obama was urging you to go out and enrich Big Oil by inflating your tires instead of buying gas.

Um, since when do gas stations buy air from oil companies? Why would oil companies sell air? The fact of the matter is, the only profits go to the service station owners, not big oil...that is if the station in question charges for air at all. Also, people can go out and buy an air pump or pressure tank and do it themselves. Of course, Newt probably never deals with the maintenance of his car(s), so what the hell would he know anyways?

Rachel Takes On Proto-Newt

Gingrich Bites The Dust Before He Even Starts Running

The stories about Newt Gingrich's presidential aspirations are about to come to a close. After dropping hints for the last few months about a possible bid, he has officially bowed out before even announcing a campaign committee. Last week he pledged that if he could find $30 million in donations he would enter the fray that he sees as no match for the Clinton machine. Personally, it would have been great to have seen Newt run, the possibilities to attack him are endless. Instead, Newt is taking the easy way out by offering lame excuses.

From The Huffington Post:

WASHINGTON — Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich will not run for president in 2008 after determining he could not legally explore a bid and remain as head of his tax-exempt political organization, a spokesman said Saturday.

"Newt is not running," spokesman Rick Tyler said. "It is legally impermissible for him to continue on as chairman of American Solutions (for Winning the Future) and to explore a campaign for president."

Gingrich decided "to continue on raising the challenges America faces and finding solutions to those challenges" as the group's chairman, Tyler said, "rather than pursuing the presidency."

Too bad for him, at least we still have a bunch of miscreants to take down as the clock to election day slowly ticks down.

Gingrich Is "Sickened" And Sickening

Nutty Newt keeps talking to the press as a non-candidate candidate who is sick of our government as it is. I will give him credit on that, President Bush is a complete idiot when it comes to effectively 'presidentin in mer-ika.' The problem is that Newt wouldn't do much better with what is coming out of his mouth now (and if you remember the Contract With ON America, he wasn't much better in the past either).

Here's Newt in all his glory, via The Atlanta Journal-Constitution:

Gingrich said that the "war here at home" against illegal immigrants is "even more deadly than the war in Iraq and Afghanistan."

"As an American, I am sickened that the political leadership of America could continue to go on vacation and do nothing," he said. "Why are the August vacations for the president and the Congress more precious than the lives of young Americans who are being killed because of government incompetence and inaction."

Gingrich said that President Bush should call Congress back into special session for three days to pass a bill in honor of the slain students.

The measure should order the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Department of Homeland Security to outsource the development of an identification system to check the legal status of felons and have it up and running by Jan. 1, 2008, he said.

What this bill would do to effectively curb crimes like that in Newark is beyond me. Of course, Newt doesn't care about common-sense efforts to curb crime, he'd rather appeal to the racist and bigoted right-wing that loves this type of talk. Why mention the obvious (the great majority of undocumented immigrants come here to work, not commit crimes) when incendiary wing-nut talking points make headlines. Newt may be sickened by immigrants, but really, he is the most nauseating person in the room.

Some Adulterous Behavior Is Better Than Others

Tom DeLay, former Majority Leader and master hypocrite is up to his usual antics in a highly unusual way. He spoke up about adultery the other day, both about his own, Bill Clinton's and the Speaker of the House at the time, Newt Gingrich. He proclaims that his adultery wasn't as bad as Newt's while the impeachment proceedings were going on because he wasn't having an affair at the time. Well Tom, in that case, I guess you are the better man (*cough, cough*).

From The New Yorker:

In the book, DeLay criticizes Gingrich for, among other things, conducting an affair with a Capitol Hill employee during the 1998 impeachment trial of Bill Clinton. (The woman later became Gingrich’s third wife.) “Yes, I don’t think that Newt could set a high moral standard, a high moral tone, during that moment,” DeLay said. “You can’t do that if you’re keeping secrets about your own adulterous affairs.” He added that the impeachment trial was another of his “proudest moments.” The difference between his own adultery and Gingrich’s, he said, “is that I was no longer committing adultery by that time, the impeachment trial. There’s a big difference.” He added, “Also, I had returned to Christ and repented my sins by that time.”

In fact, DeLay speaks of Gingrich with undisguised contempt. “He’s got this new shtick now—‘solutions,’ he calls it, like government is the new solution. Government isn’t the solution; it’s the problem.” DeLay smiled. “Did you see that he had a love match with John Kerry on global warming?” he said. “That’s not going to help him with the Presidential race.”

Well, well. As long as you have returned to Christ, then that makes it all okay (in your own mind). Even now that he is out of the House, under indictment and promoting a pathetic little book, the man cannot stop being his hypocritical self. Newt may not be able to set any kind of moral tone, but that does not give DeLay the right to criticize him without atoning for his own misdeeds. The fact is they are both amoral Republican scumbags....and that pretty much sums it up.

Gingrich A Hypocrite? No Way!

Calling Newt a hypocrite would be like calling the sky blue on a clear day, or predicting that the s would rise after the night. The clearest case of his 'the pot calling the kettle black' is over marital infidelity. As you may remember, Newt was one of Bill Clinton's most ardent opponents when he raised the issue of impeaching Bill over the Monica Lewinsky scandal nearly 10 years ago.

Now that Newt wants to run for President, he wants to make an early admission of his own affair that went on at the same time as Clinton's impeachment proceedings. Newt may be a 'social conservative' on the issues like gay marriage, but in his own life he is an adulterer and currently on his third wife, after leaving the first one while she was sick in the hospital. Quite the pious man Newt is.

MSNBC took an in-depth look at Newt's admission in an interview with Focus on the Family's James Dobson:

Newt Blames The Victims

Possible Presidential aspirant and former ethical disgrace Newt Gingrich recently decried Hillary Clinton as ruthless. He really should take a good look in the mirror. Many know of his story about abandoning his wife while she was sick in the hospital. The display of the cold blood that runs in his veins was directed towards the victims of Hurricane Katrina.

From Our Future:

He blamed the residents of New Orleans' 9th Ward for a "failure of citizenship," by being "so uneducated and so unprepared, they literally couldn't get out of the way of a hurricane."

And he called for a "deep investigation" into this "failure of citizenship."

Here's the full quote:

How can you have the mess we have in New Orleans, and not have had deep investigations of the federal government, the state government, the city government, and the failure of citizenship in the Ninth Ward, where 22,000 people were so uneducated and so unprepared, they literally couldn't get out of the way of a hurricane. (emphasis original)

To listen to the audio, click here.

Newt Rails Hillary: This Is What Bipartisanship Gets Ya

After so many years of being bashed by Republicans, Hillary sought to find a centrist middle ground in the Senate. The junior Senator reached out across the aisle to many Republicans to work on legislation. One of those Republicans was Newt Gingrich. You might even remember the two of them teaming up to work on health care. This was only a few short years after he helped lead a charge to smear the then First Lady's failed bid to provide Universal Health Care shortly after Bill became President.

So what does Newt do after she reached out to him and other Republicans to build a consensus?

Well Newt certainly had some nice words for Hillary and the Clintons in general. This came from the New York Post this morning:

March 1, 2007 -- Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich yesterday called Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton "a nasty woman" who runs an "endlessly ruthless" campaign machine.

The conservative Republican made the surprising comments - after months of taking care not to trash the Democratic presidential front-runner - in a wide-ranging New York Post editorial-board interview.

Asked whether Americans are ready to elect Rudy Giuliani - a leader, the questioner noted, whom Ed Koch had called a "nasty man" - Gingrich shot back, "As opposed to a nasty woman?"

Oooooh, a nasty woman. That is quite the intellectual commentary coming from a man with a history of nastiness. Anything else to add Newt?

"Nobody will out-mud the Clintons," said Gingrich, who added that he'll decide in the coming months whether to run for the White House.

He called Clinton's political team one of the most "talented" in U.S. history, but "endlessly ruthless."

"You can't beat them tactically . . . They're too relentless, they're too well-organized, they have too big a machine and they'll just grind you down," he said.

"If they think [Obama] is a real threat, they'll just grind him up."

Ouch! Ground-up Obama? That sounds painful. Seriously though, for someone would only run for President next year on the most remote of chances, why bother making harsh commentary like that? Why would the liberal bashing NY Post want to interview him? Perhaps he is trying to look like a tough guy with all the doubt surrounding Giuliani and McCain.

I think that Newt is seriously underestimating Barack Obama and the un-mentioned John Edwards. The nasty backbiting campaign tricks from years past are wearing thin on voters. Now would be a great time for candidates such as Obama and Edwards to rise above this type of viciousness and show the American public that politicians can rise above the mud-slinging.

Newt has no business in the Democratic primary and he should really stick to his own side. Hillary can sling mud all she wants, but when it comes down to it Democratic voters are going to see her stance on the war and weigh their decision heavily on that, not what Gingrich says about her.

Hillary Has An Ego Problem

Hear ye, hear ye, the candidate to beat is Hillary, so says Hillary. Actually Hillary remarked that Karl Rove, Newt Gingrich and Tom Delay have said she is the top Democratic dog in 2008. Well isn't that informative, because to believe your political enemies is always the correct strategy in these times.

From The Politico:

It was a roundabout endorsement, to be sure, but Hillary Rodham Clinton Sunday cited none other than White House political adviser Karl Rove to make her case that she is the most electable Democrat in 2008.

Campaigning in New Hampshire, Clinton claimed that she -- and her husband, the former president -- are the Democrats that Rove and other leading Republican handicappers fear most.

"I know what Gingrich tells people privately, I know what DeLay tells people privately, I know what Karl Rove tells people privately," she said. "I'm the one person they are most afraid of. Bill and I have beaten them before, and we will again."

It is so amusing to find these stories where the candidate is completely trapped in a bubble and loves to hear great things about themselves all the time. It is tragic however, when your supposed adversaries are whispering these sweet nothings in your ear and you happily believe every single word. To be fair, if the devil was wearing a red dress I would believe her too...unless she wears Prada, then I run really fast.