Gingrich pitch to conservatives: Don't vote for Santorum

Myrtle Beach, South Carolina (CNN) - Newt Gingrich delivered a staunch warning to South Carolina conservatives Monday: "Any conservative who votes for anyone but Newt helps elect a moderate as the nominee."

Gingrich was speaking to a tea party-friendly audience in South Carolina's Horry County when he painted presidential frontrunner Mitt Romney as unelectable in a general election.

"Ask yourself this simple question: Why would you want to nominate the guy who lost to the guy who lost to Obama?"

"The only reason [Romney] is electable right now is because he has raised more money from Wall Street to buy more ads than anybody else in the race, and we're not going to win that game," Gingrich said. "If you count how much money you can raise as the number one test of electability, Obama's going to drown him."

Gingrich has five days to drive home the message that Romney can't beat President Barack Obama. In order to stop the former Massachusetts governor's crushing momentum, Gingrich needs to rally conservatives behind him over competitor Rick Santorum, who has strong evangelical support and has fared better than the former House speaker in Iowa and New Hampshire.

"If you're a conservative, just look at the polls. I am the only candidate capable of stopping a moderate from winning the nomination," said Gingrich.

I am not going to engage in a word battle with any of you zombie-god people.

As a Christian of the reformed tradition I don't want to engage in a word battle, but I'll just respond if I may. I'm always open to a good conversation.

IMHO, an understanding of the Christian tradition of America is important to understanding freedom, prosperity and America's past and future.

The history of the reformed denominations in early America is a fascinating one, and if one understands the theological issues at dispute in England and the rest of Europe for a few hundred years prior to the "pilgrims" of 1620, and if one understands the basics of issues of the Reformation, one can gain essential insights into why the U.S. Constitution wound up reading like it does. IMHO, one really can't understand America without understanding what was going on in Europe prior to it's formation. And one can't understand that Europe without understanding theological issues surrounding the Reformation. IMHO, it is utterly amazing to see how the relationship between various Christian denominations that were in bloody wars during the Reformation were allowed to develop into the peaceful relationships we see between them in America today; and the invention of the printing press seemed to happen at the right time to cause Christianity to grow and strengthen out of all those struggles. It's almost like if it were a movie, people would say it was too fantastic to be realistic.

The true Christian perspective, incidentally, is exactly the opposite of "zombie-like", or perhaps we could say believing without thinking. In fact, the reformation movement began with theologians that questioned doctrine that had wandered away from Scripture, ergo, they sought to "reform" the Church to correct errors. While many "professing" Christians today are lacking in knowledge of true Biblical teaching, that does not mean that the Bible is wrong, but just that they do not know it very well. There are Christians who are very knowledgable of Scripture and know very well what they believe and why.

I am going to do whatever it takes to get Obama out of the oval office.

Obama is certainly acting contrary to America's interests. But we can't know the future, and current events can lead to future consequences - both good and bad - that we have no way of foreseeing in the present day. There is such a thing as a bad leader causing a "sleeping" people to wake up and see the errors of their ways, where a leader they "think is good" may in fact do just as much damage but since they think he is on their side they "stay asleep" and let him make those mistakes.

IMHO, America's real problem has been society going in a very bad direction for decades, and this was really caused by misguided ideas which actually started in the 1800's and some even further back in the 1700's. It's only now when the bad effects of this bad direction, which have been piling up for decades, start causing severe pain that those who can still think somewhat logically start getting stirred up enough to act.

In the American Revolution, there was a large part of the colonial population that remained loyal to the Crown and a large part that was ambivolent about the whole matter, or at least were too afraid to get involved. Political leaders are important towards effecting changes for the good, but a single leader is not the ultimate deciding factor in whether a nation succeeds or fails. General Washington conceded the role of the hand of God in the Revolution, probably starting notably with the early morning fog that enabled a successful escape to New York City recounted at washingtontimes.com, but certainly continuing with so many other circumstances which seemed "lucky" that after a while the notion of luck begins to strain credulity even for the most hard-hearted.

(Excerpted from washingtontimes.com)

"At the height of the battle, Washington saw with regret the slaughter of his best troops. With nothing in his power to prevent defeat of his men, no match to the disciplined British troops, out numbering them two to one, Washington had but two choices. He must either put all his forces into the battle at once, and risk all on a single battle, or evacuate the island. He went with the wiser plan of evacuation which entailed the movement of 9,000 men, horses, baggage, provision, and military stores from Long Island to New York City across the East River. During the thirteen hour transport, the British troops were not 600 yards away; it was said they could be heard at work with pick-axes. General Washington would not close his eyes for forty-eight hours, and was almost constantly on horse-back. Despite the urgings of his generals, he remained last upon the shore until all of his men had safely reached the other side.

Around 2:00 AM that night a heavy fog enveloped the whole of Long Island. The retreat was completed without interruption sometime after the dawn of the next day."

Source: The Life of George Washington, written by David Ramsay, 1807

http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/truth-be-told/2010/jan/25/miraculous-escape-new-york-city/

>> What is wrong with women? <<

Here’s the big problem:

A majority seem to dislike Newt, even a majority among self-described conservative women.

Sure, some female FReepers now probably will pipe up and tell us how much they adore Newt. Go ahead and flame me if you will.

But those flamers won’t be a representative sample — not representative of the American electorate as a whole and not even representative of the “average” GOP female voter.

Newt did a fantastic job last night. Even my Newt-bashing, ultra-conservative wife liked his performance. But she still ain’t for changing. Newt’s baggage is just too heavy.

In other words, Newt’s rhetoric simply doesn’t correspond to Newt’s reality. And the reality is this:

A dazzlingly brilliant, fire-breathing, puffy faced, overweight, angry, undisciplined and adulterous Newt simply ain’t gonna fly with the national electorate, especially given that this electorate has a female majority.

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