>> If Gingrich is the answer, Tea Party has failed
Bogus condition.
Gingrich mocked the Tea Party and Sarah Palin directly. He is a despicable man!
Gingrich mocked the Tea Party and Sarah Palin directly. He is a despicable man!
Let me offer another opinion on Newt.
For the last decade, Newt has been wandering in the wilderness - trying to stay both relevant and solvent. That makes for strange bedfellows as different interests align and then break apart.
I wrote him off after the global warming episode. That was really stupid. Then his position on single payer insurance just nailed the lid on tighter. Yes, it is the “humane” thing to do, but no nation can afford it.
I regretted it but I felt that we did not need another political opportunist... even a really smart one.
I first met Newt back in the 80’s when I heard him give an answer on problems in education and offer a plan for teaching kids to read that just nailed it. I thought, wow, if that guy ever runs for president, I’m on board. Then, his career peaked or crashed and he went off the radar.
After the Nancy Pelosi debacle, I didn’t pay any attention to him until these debates of the last few months. Romney was slick, but, too slick. Newt was the “adult” in the room.
I have come to the belief that he is a the right choice for right now because he really does know the right answers.
With his deep, deep sense of history and this being his moment, I do not believe that he would veer to the left. If anything, I think that he realizes that we are out of time and a historically great president is needed.
To save the Republic, we need someone who understands the system, has a perspective that allows them to make tough decisions and is to be able to communicate the reasons why and squelch the opposition. It is a rare ability... and he has it.
There is not another person on the horizon who can do what we need.
That said, out of pure self interest, I’m going to forgive his sins and get behind him.
The Republicans could offer as a candidate a combination of George Washington and A. Lincoln and the MSM would attack them.
This article is the type of "reporting" we have seen develope over the last few months and we will see wose over the next year as the MSM gears up for the benefit of "The Divine One."
“The important thing is to establish a political climate of opinion which will make it politically profitable for the wrong people to do the right thing. ... - Milton Friedman
Baloney.
If ROMNEY or HUNTSMAN wins, the Tea Party looses.
Gingrich is a good conservative. Has he strayed? All fall short of the Glory of God. But he’s a hell of a lot better than Romney, Hunstman and, OF COOURSE, Obama!!
Suddenly Buster the bulldog fell on the ground, sound asleep. He was dog-tired.
In a way, threads are like dogs, know what I mean?
The liberal hacks at the Boston Globe are getting frightened of a Gingrich candidacy, methinks.
I think I agree with this guy. The question is, did the Tea Party fail months ago, or are they just in the process of failing, and can still correct their error?
So far, the tea party has rejected four candidates in turn (although Paul doesn’t really count, so maybe it’s 3) — Romney, Bachmann, and then Perry.
Romney was a clear case. Bachmann was surprising, but seemed to be driven by the “We really want Sarah Palin” problem. Perry I think was the same thing, getting trashed from the right long before his debate failures took him out (and in fact, those attacks are what precipitated much of his debate problems, as he was unprepared for the questioning of his basic conservative and tea party credentials).
Cain was not rejected by the tea party, he simply was never really a good candidate, he wasn’t experienced enough to be president, and the swarm which was just jumping from candidate to candidate jumped TO him because he looked suddenly “electable”, and then jumped away because he started looking “unelectable”.
Now they have swarmed over to Gingrich. They will swarm again if Gingrich falls — but since Gingrich isn’t that conservative, it will be harder for the Tea Party to take him down. It was easy for the “Tea Party” to destroy Bachmann and Perry, because those two WERE conservatives and their base was the conservatives, so when the conservatives abandoned them, they didn’t have a liberal/moderate backstop like Gingrich will have.
Anyway, the Tea Party can’t save Cain. Cain is Sarah Palin, except with no ability to fix his appeal to the majority of republicans he would need anymore. But he can probably hold 15% through the primaries, because he’ll have half the tea party’s 30% supporting him.
That 15% will be enough to guarantee that none of the real conservatives (Bachmann, Perry, Santorum) have a shot at coming back, and will usher in Gingrich if we are LUCKY, or Romney if Gingrich’s coming implosion happens just before the Iowa Caucus when it’s too late.
The problem is, why would the tea party abandon Cain? And should they? If you want to stop Gingrich, I think they have to — Cain has nowhere to capture votes back, because the swarm ALWAYS thought that Cain and Gingrich were both just peachy (as did many of the Cain supporters when Gingrich wasn’t a threat, remember all of the “At Last, Two Adults In the Room” comments?)
There was a time the Cain supporters argued that Perry should quit to help Cain out. Well, Perry is at 8%, so he doesn’t have the votes for Cain — and frankly, Perry’s support would likely jump to Gingrich anyway, since those people still with Perry blame Bachmann and Cain for Perry’s problems, what with Bachmanns absurd attacks essentially blaming Perry for raping 12-year-olds, and Cain calling Perry a racist and then blaming Perry for women filing harrassments suits against Cain in the 1990s.
If Cain dropped out, his supporters would probably jump to Gingrich. So it’s not about Cain leaving — it’s about the tea party folks, who don’t want Gingrich, going back to one of the conservative candidates who still have a base of support.
I haven’t chosen a candidate yet. But if you want to stop Gingrich, I believe (and this is a hard sell to a group who sees their candidate at twice the poll numbers of Perry) the best way to do that would be to jump back to Rick Perry. He has the organization, he has the money. He has a decade-long record of conservative actions and opinions. If you take every non-conservative attack against him, real or imagined, and count them with all of the things he has said or done that were clearly conservative, he has a 98%+ conservative record. When you have taken HUNDREDS of actions, a few will be bad.
I don’t see Bachmann as having the capability of being the one to come back, although she certainly is conservative enough. And sadly, I don’t see Santorum having the time to be the next one to get the swarm, because time ran out.
But it is up to the Tea Party. I see a clear choice — accept Gingrich and jump to him to ensure Romney doesn’t win, or abandon Cain for Perry, and hope he can minimalize his gaffes enough to get the swarm back (I happen to believe that if Perry jumped 5 points, the media would say he was “making a comeback” and the swarm WOULD come back to him).
If the tea party continues to back Cain, it will mean Gingrich OR Romney will win without the tea party, and will have no interest or concern to listen to them.
I do see what the Cain supporters are likely to do though — push for Cain to be Romney’s (or Gingrich’s) VP nominee, and argue that so long as we have a “conservative” as VP we “won”. Hogwash. VP means squat, especially with a strong-headed President like Gingrich, who wouldn’t give Cain the time of day.
Don’t believe me? Go back and watch their ill-named “Lincoln/Douglass” style “debate”. There was not ONE time in that entire debate where Gingrich reacted to ANYTHING Cain said with the idea that Cain had merit and Gingrich would consider what he said.
The “tea party” is essentially just the GOP rank and file.
They have always been out there, but as things get worse they are becoming more and more vocal. And the result is that there are a few conservatives in the race, and the others have to at least talk the talk.
We can’t go on autopilot. We have to push to get the best we can get from the humans who have put themselves out there as candidates, and then we have to keep on pushing. If Bachmann or Santorum would come out on top, we still would have to keep on pushing and hold their feet to the fire.
And whoever wins is going to be limited by the lack of support in congress... and only we can do anything about that, and only over time. They’ll be limited by the fact that the institutions and judgeships are riddled with frauds and anti-constitutionalists, and again that can only be solved over time.
There is no silver bullet. This is a generational fight and it will never be over.
If Gingrich is the Answer, then Congress and the Senate will be the other 2/3 of the Answer. Congress spends, Presidents sign.
And Hopefully this latest “immigration” scare that Newt has just experienced (again) will make him adopt some planks that Congress with Pass as laws, as the GOP takes over the other 2/3 rds.
And then we have the VP slot, which may be an Important Tea Party personna’....that just may be what Gingrich needs, and VP’s go on to be presidents in most instances...Joe Biden being a rare exception.
Tea Party has won huge gains in state legislatures.
Tea Party has changed the discussion.
It's been less than three years since the movement started and about two years since it became directly involved in picking winners and losers.
If the new president is successful reigniting a robust economy, in four years everybody will proclaim themselves Tea Party patriots.
The Boston Globe aka TNYT is ready to have another tea party but can’t admit what is going to be thrown over the edge is their commie master. Conservatives aren’t eating their sour grapes they are serving with their pablum propaganda.
The Tea Party "revolution" appears to have been vastly overrated.
The Tea Party has barely gotten started. There are a lot of failure-minded people at FR, that’s all.
The Tea Party is held to a standard no other political movement has ever been held to, so I think saying the first presidential election since its inception not going its way indicating its failure—after a successful Congressional election is, no offense, retarded.
This is the Boston Glob.
They are full of shit. The tea party has won because put the brakes on Obamas leftist radical agenda.The Tea party had the biggest election turnaround in 70 years.
This like saying the original tea party back in the 1700’s was a failure because the Brits didn’t pack up and leave immediatley.
Some of you people who agree with horseshit column are just as insane as the flea baggers.You cannot turn around the titanic on a dime.And those that think that you will or can elect a crystl pure true conservative candidate are f’n clueless and please don’t drive alone. I don’t give a shit what Limbaugh says.Ask Rush how operation chaos worked out for ya. (without the spin)
The tea party has changed the course of this country and the conversation without a doubt.