Gingrich's Damn the Torpedoes Morning in America
ShareWhatever happened to the old politician's trick of answering the question you wanted to be asked, instead of the one that you actually were asked?
If you assume Newt Gingrich wants to talk about his plans for America, he managed to do that maybe twice, and briefly, in a 17-minute appearance Sunday on ABC's This Week. For the most part he aired his grievances against Mitt Romney and Romney's establishment buddies in the kind of subtle language for which he's famous. It was no Reaganesque Sunday Morning in America. It was more like damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead.
To summarize: Gingrich said the articles and attacks against him have been "breathlessly dishonest." Romney has run "a campaign of vilification." He has been "relentlessly negative," not to mention "blatantly dishonest" by giving "just plain false" debate answers. Which were also "just plain not true" and "just plain actually false." And made it impossible for Gingrich to give a good debate performance Thursday night. If you assume Newt Gingrich wants to talk about his plans for America, he managed to do that maybe twice, and briefly, in a 17-minute appearance Sunday on ABC's This Week. For the most part he aired his grievances against Mitt Romney and Romney's establishment buddies in the kind of subtle language for which he's famous. It was no Reaganesque Sunday Morning in America. It was more like damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead.
As for Romney's supposed managerial talents, "every time it's bad, he didn't know about it or he wasn't aware about it." The 23 foreign bank accounts that weren't reported. The abortion services covered under the Massachusetts health law. His board membership with a company that got "the largest Medicare fine in history for fraud."
"I want to talk about big issues," Gingrich suddenly interjected at one point. He mentioned housing, jobs and entitlement reform in passing, and offered a one-sentence explanation of his Social Security proposal to let young Americans choose a personal Social Security account (in the stock market) instead of an account handled by the government.
Big issues were then officially over and Gingrich was back to the difficulties of being assaulted by Romney's "carpet-bombs with Wall Street money"; asserting that Romney will "hang out with his establishment friends, managing the decay" of a declining America; and bemoaning that his record of tax-cutting and balanced budgets as House speaker "is wiped away by Romney's totally phony history, which he maniacally continues to repeat." Also, Romney is "fundamentally dishonest" and trying to hide "his liberal record in Massachusetts.
The ratio of complaints and attacks, as opposed to what exactly he'd like to do as president, aside from being visionary, was quite remarkable. It may be that this was what Gingrich wanted to be talking about -- that it was his deliberate strategy, perhaps his only option, given that polls suggest Romney is well ahead of him in Florida.
Romney accused Gingrich of making excuses, just like President Obama. On the other hand, the Romney campaign also unfurled a series of character affidavits from big guns -- two governors (Chris Christie of New Jersey and Bob McDonnell of Virginia); two House members (Jason Chaffetz of Utah and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen of Florida), and former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty. Chaffetz said Gingrich's "desperate" campaign had devolved into "character assassination." Pawlenty said Gingrich had gone "over the line" and "way out of bounds."
The avalanche of praise -- the Romney campaign seems to have gone to the thesaurus to find synonyms for "impeccable" -- suggested a certain degree of anxiety, a campaign that simply counters every attack, or both.
First the Republicans skirmished over capitalism. Now it's character. Remember when snarking that someone was "likeable enough" or too green to be trusted with a 3 a.m. crisis call was considered a low blow? Clearly we're not in 2008 anymore.
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