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May 19, 2011 09:12 PM UTC

Newt Gingrich Getting The Dan Maes Treatment

  • 16 Comments
  • by: Colorado Pols

The Fox News Channel’s Judson Berger reports, it’s at least partly self-inflicted:

Gingrich has already conceded he made a “mistake” in choosing to describe the House Budget Committee chairman’s proposal as “right-wing social engineering” in an interview over the weekend. But Tyler, pressed for reaction by The Huffington Post to the media coverage Gingrich endured, offered what looked to be an excerpt from an epic poem starring the ex-House speaker, trudging through a world of Cyclopean Sunday show hosts and editorial writers.

Excerpting it does little justice, so here is the response in full, as published in The Huffington Post.

From Tyler: “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 so it was written…

And if that wasn’t bad enough:

Our Dan Maes parallel kind of works, doesn’t it? Now, these off-reservation hits on the GOP 2012 budget proposal from Rep. Paul Ryan didn’t start Newt Gingrich’s fall from viability as a GOP presidential candidate, but as the Washington Post’s Glenn Kessler reports, he’s left a hole where the GOP’s fiscal message used to be–a bit of a problem for the rest of the team.

And it can’t be undone.

Here are the guts of Gingrich’s answer:  

I don’t think right-wing social engineering is any more desirable than left-wing social engineering.  I don’t think imposing radical change from the right or the left is a very good way for a free society to operate.  I think we need a national conversation to get to a better Medicare system with more choices for seniors. …[The Ryan plan] is too big a jump.  I think what you want to have is a system where people voluntarily migrate to better outcomes, better solutions, better options, not one where you suddenly impose upon the – I don’t want to – I’m against Obamacare, which is imposing radical change, and I would be against a conservative imposing radical change.

The real question is not whether Gingrich thinks he made a mistake. Clearly he thinks he made a political mistake, or else he would not be dialing Ryan to grovel.

The question that he has not answered is: Do you still believe the Ryan plan is “radical” or “right-wing social engineering”?

The problem here, as we said previously, isn’t really for Newt Gingrich. Newt Gingrich, like Ron Paul or Rick Santorum or Lyndon LaRouche, is never going to be President. But what happens to Colorado freshmen Rep. Cory Gardner, and especially early “Ryan Plan” adopter Rep. Scott Tipton, if this “right-wing social engineering” business becomes a relevant question for their constituents? Isn’t this more a problem for Republicans who actually voted for it?

One other note: it seemed to us like the more overtly Republicans tried to get Dan Maes to shut the hell up, the more coverage he received in the media. Funny how that works, isn’t it?

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16 thoughts on “Newt Gingrich Getting The Dan Maes Treatment”

  2. If a washed up sideshow says something stupid, it could bring down everybody else in his party.

    If that’s true, and since you mentioned Lyndon LaRouche, LaRouche has a witty comparison of Obamacare to Nazi ovens you might want to elevate the way you do this. Zing!

    2. of believing that rank-and-file hard right nuts like you spoke for all Americans, and he paid for it in the 90s. Now you’re making the same mistake.

      If a washed up sideshow …

      That may be how you guys view Newt. And it’s accurate, don’t get me wrong. But what he also is, to most NON-hard right nuts who vote, is one of the recognizable faces of the GOP. That matters a lot more than your party’s apparent disavowal of the man.

      1. We care about policy. The Ryan Plan is more than a budget, it’s a reflection of our philosophy. That’s why conservatives are outraged at Gingrich, and that’s why his stupidity doesn’t matter to Republicans.

        Unlike Democrats, we’re not led around by our “recognizable faces.”

        1. You were addressing the specific observation that Gingrich’s comments could hurt the GOP as a whole.

          Guess what? It takes more than the hard right nuts to elect a president.

          You know what that means? That it’s not your opinion about this that matters. It’s the swing voter whose opinion matters.

        2. 4 fux sake you LIE

          all your ilk cares about is Obama’s birth certificate, defunding NPR, banning fed $s on reproductive services, decimating Ed spending, suppressing minority voting … where the fuck does it end?

          Pure bullshit that you’re now turning on your revered policy wonk when you bowed down & blew him wet kisses for 20+ yrs (betcha that Contract on America was your 90’s wet dream).

          Pathetic hypocrisy is all too recognizable and all too rampant under your tent.

        4. Sarah Palin is one of your “recognizable faces,” and I’d say she’s doing quite a lot of leading around.

          As is Rush.

          And Beck.

          And O’Really.

  3. but not with Gingrich.

    What if Area 51 guy gets it…

    GOP ‘likelies’ and early candidates/potentials each self destruct (ala McInnis/Gingrich), drop out (Penry/Barbour/Trump/etc.), or get destroyed by one another…

    So it goes to the one left standing who can get the crazy based fired up…

    And voila! Ron Paul is your 2012 GOP presidential nominee

    I’m not saying its going to happen, mind you.  But wouldn’t that be fun!

  4. I think we need a national conversation to get to a better Medicare system with more choices for seniors

    The Salamander is lying and he knows it.  Seniors are pretty happy with Medicare.  The problem is it costs too damn much.  The word no-one wants to say is “rationing.”

  5. I know this because I was out and the weather got nasty again. I wanted to get the latest, so like the damm old fool that I am, I turned KOA on. In the olden days, KOA was the go-to-station for current news on local weather and traffic….24/7.  Instead, I got one fat fart “scolding” the other fat fart. The latter was doing the “Thank you sir, may I have another” sick bit. Gingrich and Limbaugh…together again. This is our “best and brightest?”

    This is no way to run a country. no way.  PLus, I wound up on a flooded street.  

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