Noonan, Krauthammer to GOP: You're losing this thing

Politico ^ | 1/20/12 | ALEXANDER BURNS

[Qbert]

Two prominent conservative columnists, Charles Krauthammer and Peggy Noonan, warn this morning that Republican infighting may do the party grievous damage for the 2012 election, with Krauthammer declaring that President Obama "could not have chosen more self-destructive adversaries."

Here's Krauthammer on GOP candidates playing into Obama's message reboot:

For the first few weeks, the class-envy gambit had some effect, bumping Obama’s numbers slightly. But the story was still lagging, suffering in part from its association with an Occupy rabble that had widely worn out its welcome.

Then came the twist. Then came the most remarkable political surprise since the 2010 midterm: The struggling Democratic class-war narrative is suddenly given life and legitimacy by . . . Republicans! Newt Gingrich and Rick Perry make the case that private equity as practiced by Romney’s Bain Capital is nothing more than vulture capitalism looting companies and sucking them dry while casually destroying the lives of workers….

How quickly has the zeitgeist changed? Wednesday, the Republican House reconvened to reject Obama’s planned $1.2 trillion debt-ceiling increase. (Lacking Senate concurrence, the debt ceiling will be raised nonetheless.) Barely noticed. All eyes are on South Carolina and Romney’s taxes.

This is no mainstream media conspiracy. This is the GOP maneuvering itself right onto Obama terrain.

And here's Noonan on the 2012 field racing into a "John Grisham novel"-like phase of the primary campaign:

Secret offshore bank accounts, broken love, the testimony of anguished ex-wives: "He wanted an open marriage." A battered old veteran emerges from the background and, in his electoral death throes, provides secret information—"I'm for Newt"—that he hopes will upend a dirty, rotten establishment. A vest-wearing choir boy turns out to have been the unknown winner of that case back in Iowa. And all this against the backdrop of a mysterious firm that moves in and destroys communities—"When Mitt Romney came to town . . ."—while its CEO pays nothing in taxes.

If you are a Republican who hates a mess, or if you are a member of that real but elusive and hydra-headed thing, the GOP establishment, you are beside yourself with anxiety and unhappiness. You think: "They're losing this thing! They're going to limp out of South Carolina, they'll limp through Florida, they're killing each other and killing the party's chances. How will they look by the fall? What are independents going to think of the guy we finally put up? We all know politics ain't beanbag, but it's not supposed to be a clown-car Indy 500 with cars hitting the wall and guys in wigs littering the track!"

There's been a lot of damage. We lose sense of it in the day to day, but in the aggregate it's going to prove considerable.

[zeestephen]

Vendome, enjoyed your essay.

Is that your own composition?

It's in italics, so I thought it might be a quote.

[Vendome]

Everything but the bullet points. Those are from Newts 21st Century Contract with America.

[Joe the Pimpernel]

Methinks that Newt is the most genuine SOB currently running.

Anybody but Romney.

[Pelham]

In 1984 Charles Krauthammer was writing speeches for Walter Mondale, in the attempt to defeat President Reagan.

Why this clown gets embraced as a “conservative” is a mystery to me. What he is is an opportunist.

[RipSawyer]

“He definitely has warts, pot marks and lesions all over, however his record of accomplishment is second to none and surpasses the idiot in the WH by miles.”
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Please, let us not damn Newt with faint praise, even this surreal, blithering democrat who managed to be nominated to run against Jim Demint http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pSJ6P1gS4Ys surpasses the idiot in the WH by miles.