Jan 21 2012
Newt’s Big Win In SC!
As I expected, Newt must have just walloped Romney in SC. Fox News called it before 1% of the vote was in and based on exit polls only. The exit polls must be so one sided to be amazing given the way the media is reacting. The talking heads are acting as if Romney’s candidacy is just about toast.
Update: CNN is now acting as if Romeny might lose FL. The talk across the dial is this was devastating loss for Roomney.
Update: Krauthammer notes that 2/3rds of the voters decided this week and went with Newt. Can’t wait to see the final tally. It really is becoming anyone but Romney and Obama.
Update: Exit Poll data here, and a big hat tip to Hot Air. Romney’s ‘concession’ speech is a real snorer….
He’s boring his own supporters in his own campaign room.
CP: “Word is that a lot of those Newt voters were Democrats. South Carolina is an open primary which means anyone can vote in any party’s election.” sorry, that doesn’t wash. Where did you get this ‘word’? I certainly haven’t seen that anywhere. We all know the crossovers voted for Romney and Paul. the press was backing Romney and the Dims follow the lame stream media. Your guy lost. get over it.
you need to be comparing primary numbers from 08 with these numbers.. apples to apples McCain got 143,000 in 08.
WWS: for goodness sakes, grow up. Newt won, your guy lost. quit crying. We all know that Newt started out agreeing not to lampoon other Republican candidates, so Romney immediately proceeded to spend about $30 million in Iowa lampooning Newt. so as all fighters should do, Newt took off his gloves, took back his arm that was tied behind his back and took shots at Romney. Isn’t that what candidates are supposed to do? Do you want a candidate that gives up when he loses one battle? So his ex-wife is supposed to get up and tell the same old tired story from 10 years ago two days before an election and Newt was supposed to reply that she was entirely correct, that he’s a cad? LOL…..He did exactly what he should have done. make the press look like the villains that they are.
Trent : right on, great comments.
jan: you have a problem with people being ambitious?
As I see it the real test will be Virginia!
If Ron Paul wins Virginia, it’s a sure sign only a Wall Street Fat Cat Northeastern Liberal Repunk can beat OBLahBLah!
s/
AJ,
This is the reason the MSM is saying Romney is in jeopardy in florida
See these Nate Silver clips about Florida:
Essentially all of the polling data used for the forecast, however, predates the Monday night debate in Myrtle Beach, since which time there has been a dramatic reversal of fortunes in the Republican race. Mr. Romney has lost 15 points from his lead nationwide, according to the Gallup national tracking poll. There has been an even larger swing – a net of about 21 points between Mr. Romney and Mr. Gingrich – in South Carolina.
If the Florida polls have swung as much as the national polls during the past several days, Mr. Romney would have only about a 5-point lead there now. And if the Florida polls have swung as much as the South Carolina ones have during the last week, Mr. Gingrich and Mr. Romney would now be essentially tied there.
And
But South Carolina’s seeming rejection of Mr. Romney goes beyond cultural or demographic idiosyncrasies. Mr. Romney was resoundingly defeated by Mr. Gingrich, losing badly among his worst demographic groups and barely beating Mr. Gingrich among his best ones. Had you extrapolated the exit poll cross-tabulations from South Carolina to the other 49 states, Mr. Romney might have lost 47 of them. Moreover, the decline of Mr. Romney was almost as significant in national polls as it was in South Carolina.
Data from the CNN’s exit poll showed the following:
(link: http://tinyurl.com/82ptzt5)
* Gingrich got 45% of the Republican vote to 28% for Romney.
* Independents Gingrich got 31%, Romney 25%
* Gingrich got 45% conservative vote, Romney 24%
* Moderate or Liberal voters went 31% for Gingrich, 34% for Romney
* Most Important Candidate Quality – 45% said to beat Obama – Gingrich got 51% to Romney’s 37%
* When asked who ran the most “unfair campaign” 6% said Gingrich, 49% said Romney
A Romney collapse in Florida would be definitive proof that;
a) Conservatives are the majority of the Republican voting base
b) They don’t like Romney.
The fact that former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush just rolled back his expected endorsement of Romney after S.C. says a great deal in that regard.
Michael Barone does a good bit of reporting on S.C. results in this piece titled:
“Where does the Republican race go from here?”
at this link:
http://campaign2012.washingtonexaminer.com/blogs/beltway-confidential/where-does-republican-campaign-go-here/328221
However, while reporting well, Barone is showing his “DC inside” slip here.
Newt Gingrich earned his triumphant night at the podium, and yet seemed a bit less ebullient and disciplined that I expected. He called General James Livingston, who had switched from Rick Perry to him on Wedneday, a Medal of Honor “winner”—though those who have received this award (as one assured me in South Carolina in the 2000 cycle) insist that they are not winners but simply recipients: the idea is that no one seeks an award for such astonishing bravery but only humbly receives it. Gingrich went on at greater length than any political consultant would advise—but then he has resurrected his campaign not once but twice since his original consultants left him—and paid gracious tribute to his opponents, including not only Santorum and Romney but also Ron Paul.
“Medal of Honor Winner” is the common public usage, thanks to the same mainstream media, which Gingrich is attacking, and Barone is a part of.
In this passage Barone shows that he does not understand the whole gestalt of the *F**K-YOU* CANDIDATE in the current election cycle.
But in the process he embraced causes and took on issues which may not prove sustainable in the Republican contest or the general election. He agreed with Ron Paul on “fiat money” and the Federal Reserve; he made several efforts to go after Ron Paul supporters, which could end him up in hot water later. He presented the general election as a contest between the values of Saul Alinsky and the Founding Fathers. He made generous reference to the Founders, the Declaration and the Constitution and the Federalist Papers as well. He made an interesting point about the “anti-religious bigotry of the elites” and attacked a recent decision by a federal judge in San Antonio who, he said, threatened to put a school superintendent in jail if students said they were praying, saying a benediction or mentioning God. Sounds like a dumb decision—the First Amendment bars a federal establishment of religion and then guarantees the free exercise thereof—but is this really a national issue of prime importance, or just one dumb judge sounding off? He said that no American president should bow to a Saudi king (not a bad general election point) and harshly criticized Barack Obama’s decision, criticized by the mild-mannered economics writer Robert Samuelson as “insane,” to disapprove the Keystone XL pipeline. “Obama is so weak he makes Carter look strong,” Gingrich said, close to the end of his remarks.
and
Gingrich has long argued that Republicans should emphasize issues on which 70% of Americans are on their side, but he has not always been astute about which issues on which his positions command such support. His victory in South Carolina was a victory not only over Romney and Santorum and Paul, but also over the news media, and signaled (more than I thought at the time) by the standing ovations he received from the audiences in the Fox News and CNN debates from questions by Juan Williams and John King (although neither is personally hated by Republican voters in the same way many others in what we call mainstream media are). In the 1992 campaign cycle Robert McDowell, then a Washington lawyer and now a Federal Communications Commissioner, distributed bumper stickers reading, “Annoy the media—vote for Bush.” At the time I thought was as strong an argument for reelecting Bush as any the Bush campaign was advancing. But it wasn’t enough, to say the least. Gingrich seems to me to have won the South Carolina primary, and by a handsome majority, on an “annoy the media” platform. But is that enough to win the nomination, or the presidency? And does taking on peripheral issues like anti-religious bigotry and fiat money, however cogent the intellectual arguments therefor, get him closer to the first goal or the second? I wonder.
Unlike France, where there is a entire “*F*** -YOU ELITES*” political party — the Le Penn party — to vote for. Ron Paul plays that role in American politics inside the Republican Presidential Primaries. (That is why Ron Paul gets more male than female votes.)
Gingrich sees that voter as his biggest short term primary voter growth opportunity for Florida, now that Santorm said he was staying in.
It might even work, as in, think of General Andrew Jackson and the Bank of the United States, with the Federal Reserve in the Populist villain role.
Barone, like the rest of D.C., has no clue idea how grass roots unpopular the Federal Reserve has become. Financial Talk Radio has been all over the insider games and general cluelessness of the Fed like white on rice since 2007 (They are the lest offensive radio for me in the Morning drive so I pretty much have absorbed those messages by osmosis.) Those media sources are speaking directly to both the Tea Party and the Eff-You voters.
And Barone is as clueless about what Gingrich is doing as the Romney campaign.
Gingrich is addressing, and showing deference for, the issues, fears & hopes of both groups with his talks about the Federal Reserve and fiat money.
AJ,
Several points stand out for me Byron York Piece on why Gingrich beat Romney in S.C. that both spell TEA PARTY.
http://campaign2012.washingtonexaminer.com/article/why-gingrich-won-why-romney-lost/328266
First:
Gingrich’s last event before the voting, a couple of hours later, was a rally on the hangar deck of the USS Yorktown, a World War II aircraft carrier that is now a floating museum across the bay from Charleston. It was a most un-perfect affair. To begin with, it just so happened that dozens of Cub Scouts were having an overnight on the Yorktown at the same time as Gingrich and the press showed up for the rally. Their presence contributed to an air of happy chaos on board, and Gingrich was delighted to invite a few scouts on stage with him at the beginning of his speech. When Gingrich got to the substance of his remarks, he was wandering, expansive, and detailed, where Romney had been brief and canned. But Gingrich kept the crowd with him the whole way, and in the end had engaged his audience more than Romney could have hoped for. Gingrich respected them enough to discuss issues with them seriously.
Gingrich on the campaign trail is going out of his way to engage the hopes and fears of the Tea Party.
He is respecting them and their issues, not dismissing them like Gov. Romney, or worse, mortally insulting them like Gov. Perry did on illegal immigration.
Second, the Tea Party responded to that and gave him a retail, on-the-ground, get out the vote campaign that was bigger and better than Romney’s:
Gingrich’s defeat of Romney in South Carolina Saturday was absolutely dominating. Just a week ago, Romney had a solid lead over Gingrich in the polls. On Saturday night, he lost to Gingrich by 12 points — a huge and disastrous swing. Gingrich won 44 of South Carolina’s 46 counties.
How did it happen? For one thing, all the talk about Romney having a hugely superior ground organization turned out not to be true. “They did not do the retail politics that a Santorum and a Gingrich have done over time,” said Kevin Thomas, chairman of the Fairfield County Republican Party. (Thomas was neutral in the race.) “I think Newt’s people, they had more on-the-ground staff, and they worked.” There were a lot of them, too; after Gingrich’s strong showing in the debates, said Susan Meyers, Gingrich’s media coordinator for the Southeast, “We have so many volunteers, our phones are melting right now.”
Gingrich’s campaign was also faster and more nimble than the Romney battleship. “There is a very strong contrast between the two campaign organizations,” said Gingrich adviser (and former George W. Bush administration official) Kevin Kellems. “In military terms, it’s speed versus mass. Newt Gingrich’s operation, and Newt Gingrich as a man, has a great deal of speed — intellectual speed, decisiveness. The Romney campaign is much more about money and size, having hired half of Washington D.C. And sometimes, speed beats mass.”
It certainly did this time.
Note as well that the Tea Party volunteers also showed up for Santorum.
Between Gingrich and Santorum, the Tea Party influenced “Not Romney” vote represented 57% of the Primary vote.
Redteam
I admire ambition. But, there’s a difference between legitimate and blind ambition. The former is able to see the dots leading to what they want for themselves. The latter, however, only sees their desire and will skip over the dots, at any cost, in order to achieve the end goal of their ambition.
Also, as I see it, Gingrich’s ‘ambition’ to become POTUS is more based on his desire for power and the limelight — in other words more of a self-serving desire. I see Romney’s run for POTUS as a belief that he actually has a skill that will help this country turn the economy around. He has been involved in turning companies around, the Olympics around, and I believe he feels these abilities might dovetail into serving to help turn the U.S. economy around, as well. That is honestly the basis of much of his rhetoric, versus Gingrich’s delivery of nothing more than a college fight song.
Double Ouch!
http://pjmedia.com/tatler/2012/01/21/why-romney-lost-part-i/
Why Romney Lost: Part I
Believe it or not (and I didn’t think it possible), Mormonism was one reason Romney lost South Carolina. Exit polls show that most South Carolina voters wanted a candidate that shared similar religious views. Romney lost big among those voters. Note, I am not describing what ought to be, but rather what the data show is happening.
Evangelicals are the base of the GOP. If they stay home, Republicans lose, like they did when they nominated the moderate John McCain. But more importantly, Catholics may decide this election in places like Iowa, Wisconsin, Ohio and Pennsylvania. And the Catholic Church makes no secret of its view of Mormonism. An unexcited evangelical base combined with skeptical moderate Catholic voters undermines Romney’s chief campaign message of the last month — “most likely to beat Obama.” It could be a prescription for a November defeat.
Romney will spin that Florida is his firewall because he has an organization there. But he also had one in South Carolina. Tonight was a game changer.
One other thing. Romney annoyed people in South Carolina. His robo calls, from the vaunted “organization,” annoyed voters to no end. I watched someone get 5 calls in one night, many from Chris Christie. Another person is getting them in Germany in the middle of the night on her cell phone. Sometimes organization and money backfires.</i?
jan, thanks for the response. I agree that ambition has to have a focus. I certainly believe that Obama’s focus is on having the power to dismantle the USA as we know it. That may even be ‘blind’ ambition. I’m surprised that you or anyone else would try to make an argument that Romney is only in it to improve the US and Gingrich is in it because he’s on a power trip. Maybe he should be having an affair with two women at the same time. Now that would be ‘true’ power. Or just have oral sex in the Oval office, that would really be a power trip. Correct?
I actually do believe that Romney has an ability and skill that would benefit the country, if he were allowed to use it, but unfortunately his track record goes more to the liberal side than it does the conservative and I’m only afraid Romneycare would be his standard to the destrution of the health care business in this country. We don’t need a president that is excellent at liquadating the country. We have one that is attempting that as we speak. We need one that will lead the way to making America great again. We don’t need a Romney, and I’m not sure Newt is ‘the answer’ but he’s the only one presently running that stands a chance of getting the opportunity (I still haven’t completely written Santorum off yet)
As an aside, college fight songs serve a purpose of making people feel proud and happy. Couldn’t the country use a little more of that?
The Republican elites, the MSM, and the Dimocrats have had Romney as their ‘guy’ from the beginning. Maybe that’s behind us now and the everyday Republicans and conservatives can feel good about who is running for them. Go Tea Party!!!!!
RCP has Obama beating Gingrich by 11 points. Word is also trickling out that Democrats *were* voting in the SC primary (it’s an open primary) in order to boost Gingrich’s numbers because they know Gingrich would be slaughtered in the General against Obama.
A vote for Gingrich in the primaries is a vote for Obama in the general election. There is absolutely no possible way Gingrich can win unless Democrats simply sit out the election. Even center Democrats who don’t want to vote for Obama will not vote for Gingrich after what Gingrich did to Bill Clinton while he himself was doing the very same thing.
Gingrich can’t possibly win. Stop being so emotional and THINK!
Redteam
Back to you about your response –appreciate it.
I believe that I see more where you are coming from. However, I simply don’t agree where that linkage of dislike/distrust for Romney is derived.
Let me explain…you see I don’t read Romney’s acts in venture capitalism as being any more than being an astute technocrat, cultivating a knack for knowing where the problems of efficiency, waste, mismanagement were in failing companies. Just like in failing companies, where people were let go and/or replaced, procedures were revised, and productivity lines and goals were reset, so would it be with bloated and overlapping governmental bureaucracies. Romney is a numbers guy, which may explain why his personality is more underwhelming and cautious than Gingrich’s. But, we need our numbers changed in this country more than we need a temporary fix in our spirits. We need a deficit to be reduced, either to nothing or at least to a manageable one. We need a larger work force, represented by a real unemployment number that is in the low single digits. We need entitlement and tax reform. This all involves numbers. And, when these numbers are addressed then we won’t have to be taking our deficit reduction number out of the hide of our military, reducing their strength and numbers.
As a business person myself, I trust a business man for this task rather than a Gingrich type who has nothing in his repertoire other than being a quirky, ambitious college professor (like Obama), who yearned to be in politics, and after unceremoniously leaving his speakership position remained in DC as basically a consultant/lobbyist, using his name recognition and DC status to make millions of dollars. I’m not impressed by this, nor his rallying cry, which only reminds me of my brother-in-law who shares the same kind of thundering recklessness and hubris as a way to draw attention to himself.
There have been other settings in world history, as well, which have had, at the helm of their revolution, tantalizingly vocal men, who brought people to standing ovations as well. But, such a messenger, although delivering a rousing call to action, does not always follow through once the rhetoric has elected them. And, sometimes, worse yet, their follow-through is very different than what endeared the speaker to us at election rallies in the first place. It is the deeds that count, and Romney has performed many more deeds in fiscally turning a business around than Gingrich has done at any time in his life. This is keeping an eye on the ball of where our biggest problems are festering, rather than going all Hollwood and getting misty eyed over Newt and what he now being referred to as, The Drama King!
Jan,, basically I agree with what you say. but. While it is a good argument that we need some good business principles applied to our government, there is nothing in Romney’s political career that suggests that he would use any of his business principles to do anything other than be a liberal to moderate administrator over the continued expansion of the government. Certainly Mass. didn’t drastically shrink their budget or government size while he was in charge. it matters not to me that some would argue that his state congress was liberals. That is true in New Jersey, Wisconsin and Ohio which are all currently under Tea Party conservatives and are truly shrinking their budgets and government size. Romney didn’t perform the one time he had a chance. I sure don’t put Newt in the position comparable to those other ‘tantalizing vocal men’ (I guess you mean Hitler) that were inspirational in speech but not in deeds. Basically Newt has demonstrated, while speaker, that he got the budget balanced and welfare programs reduced.
I too, am a business person, and from that perspective, I want the numbers to be good but I also want the objectives to be the correct ones and I want thought and effort put into improvements, not just a numbers game. More people need good jobs, the nation needs lower energy costs, do you have evidence that Mass greatly improved the jobs market or reduced their energy costs during his tenure. His ‘numbers’ did not demonstrate any great abilities that I’m aware of while running Mass. again, running business and goverment may not be the same thing.
Romney may do an excellent job, if elected. I sure hope so and I hope the same thing if it’s Newt that’s elected. We (you and I) likely will have very little input into who that is, but let’s hope that whichever it is, that’s it’s a good thing for the country. One thing for sure, Obama is not the answer.
CP, “Word is also trickling out that Democrats *were* voting in the SC primary (it’s an open primary) in order to boost Gingrich’s numbers because they know Gingrich would be slaughtered in the General against Obama.”
Still beating that drum huh? The ‘word’ is that the libs and Dims voted for Romney. However, the numbers in SC were close to the same as they were in 08 when they did not have an OPEN primary. Actual exit polling showed that most people that said they voted for Newt identifield themselves as Republicans. just saying.
for the record, I’m not voting for RCP in the election, I’m voting for the Republican.
What I don’t understand are those saying Gingrich is “unelectable.” How soon they forget.
People saying that are ignoring that Gingrich is a masterful populist demagogue.
Gingrich was the one who got the Republican Congress elected via the strength of popular resentment against the Congressional Check Kiting scandal and the Assault Weapon Ban.
The current political environment, and Gingrich’s ultimate general election opponent, are letter perfect for Gingrich’s divisive “outsider versus elite insider” campaigning style.
Pres. Obama is a incumbent Chicago politician, running on a poor economic record, outside Chicago.
All Obama has is the race card, hate and vote fraud.
Solyndra is minimally three order of magnitude larger than the Check Kiting Scandal ever was.
The Gunrunner “Ship American guns to the Mexican Drug cartels and create a crisis to justify restricting Gun Rights” scandal is a much bigger and a much more important for American liberty issue than the Assault Weapon Ban ever war.
Gingrich is a pig in mud for this kind of political environment.
Redteam
Reasoned and congenial posts like yours are a pleasure to read. But, again, I have another ‘however’ to add to the menu as to why I look at Romney more optimistically than you do, rather than simply viewing him as a same old, same old do-nothing politician.
Yes, his 4 year tenure as MA governor was not ‘great,’ but nevertheless his policies enacted a push-back to the growing and projected deficit being experienced when he first took over, and he left office with a small surplus. This deficit reduction involved increases in fees, closing corporate loopholes and reduction of spending. All in all, during his governorship MA remained slightly below the national average of per capita for local and state tax burdens combined.
You say that being a governor of a red state holds relatively little sway because of NJ, WI and Ohio having similar opposition in their state. However, as of now WI has a R majority in both state houses, albeit is only 1 in the Senate because of the recent recalls. I don’t think Ohio or NJ have as large of a margin of dems in their state legislatures as MA had when Romney was governor, either. For example, in his last year, Romney vetoed 250 items from the budget, which were overridden by the dem controlled legislature. You have to have huge numbers of dems for that to happen. I find it must have been similar to what we face in CA, where nothing of merit is ever passed because of the lopsidedness between the dems and Rs in the legislature here, no matter who the governor is, R or D.
I find Romneycare passing on his watch not to be as much of an issue as some see it to be. For one thing, health care costs have been an increasing issue over the past 10 years. Think tanks were musing about how to curb these costs, with mandates being one of the remedies being bantered around. As you know, even Gingrich was supporting this idea about the same time that MA was creating it’s own individual answer to healthcare. Even though Romney signed health care into law for MA, it wasn’t entirely the version he wanted, vetoing 8 sections of the legislation. Again, his vetos were overridden. Since that time, while he has not repudiated Romneycare, he time and time again, has clarified that it was a state experiment that could be repealed by the state should the citizens want it ended. He has not supported national health care, and has adamantly said he would issue waivers and hopefully work with a receptive Congress to repeal it. His answers seem reasonable to me.
I am a person who is not taken by waves of emotion when it comes to politics. I think one needs to read the small print of someone’s record, and not be caught up by the great brushstrokes of animated speeches. Gingrich was a part of the 90’s good economy. However, much of his record is based on the time he was in office, aided and abetted by the last office holder being Reagan, and the dot com boom that gave such a boost to the economy. What I look at most is Gingrich’s peers who served with him, and their overwhelming animus in supporting him now. Why is that? Is there something that they have seen, first hand, in his leadership that points to problems he might have should he be president?
Something to think about.
Wow. For a minute there I thought I was Trent Trevenko’s blog, not on AJ Strata’s! 🙂
Seriously… I like Newt a lot but I am a bit concerned. His main attraction is that he could clean Obama’s clock in the three debates.
Why does anyone think that Obama will agree to debate Newt. And if he does maybe only one – and with such stiff rules that it will be more like a press conference than a debate.
One more thing… apologies for botching Mr. Telenko’s name. My bad. 🙁
jan, I’ve not really made a study of all the things that Romney did in his term. I know he proposed many new taxes and ‘fees'(just a different word for tax) all on his own. I don’t know if he ended with a surplus or deficit. After a little googling, I find that he increased the overall tax burden of all individuals slightly during his term and did reduce the budget deficit slightly (and made it slightly positive) You can’t blame Romneycare on the Dims there, it apparently was entirely Romney’s idea to put it in. (and it is generally agreed that it is a fiasco) how could Romney have ever perceived it to be a ‘good business’ decision? It’s also a telling thing to me that he was not able to increase the Republican members in the legislature.
I do stand corrected on the makeup of the Wisc legislature. (memory fails sometimes)
If you recall, Clinton had taken office after GHW Bush and had started raising the budget and welfare. Newt ran on the ‘Contract with America’ and got re-elected and voted in as Speaker in 94. He led a reduction in spending to create a budget surplus and reduced Welfare as we knew it. He certainly should get some credit for it.
Tho I favor the conservatism of the tea party and Newt, if it comes to it, I’d still prefer the liberalism of Romney to the liberalism of Obama.
I haven’t seen or heard all this ‘animus’ of fellow house members against Newt. But jealousy is a strong motivator.
I will vote for Romney if he is the candidate, as i’ve said before.
just to be clear, Romney is far from “my guy”. I just ended up having to defend him because it looks like it comes down to a choice between Romney and Gingrich for the nomination, and I have this unshakeable belief that Newt is going to do something outrageous that will destroy his candidacy before the general election. I wouldn’t have that worry about most candidates, but with Newt, I do.
A republican Bill Clinton – I just can’t buy into the idea, although who knows – I may have to. Honestly, I’ve started hoping that a brokered convention could draft Chris Christie or something. (Don’t worry, I know that’s a ridiculous hope)
Redteam,
I do recall how dismal Clinton’s first few years were, as well as how the Republican Congress came in with The Contract for America. However, the economic environment was ramping up. The recession was ebbing giving way to the dot com boom,as I said before. Basically, the environment from which Newt is now emphasizing as being due to his brilliant leadership was a good environment in which to succeed.
For instance, if Romney had been Governor of MA during those days, and Newt had been speaker in the time frame of 2003-2007 (post 911), might the records of both men been quite different — Newt accomplishing little, while Mitt might have made more headway, with a good economic wind at his back.
Again, if Newt’s leadership was so instrumental during that wonderful economic period of more jobs and a good economy, why aren’t his cohorts, who lived and worked with him during that time period, rallying behind him and giving him his due?
If Newt became the R nominee, and somehow beat Obama, don’t you think having some political alliances would be helpful during this time of gridlock? Instead, he has few allies and lots of people who hold grudges against him. I just don’t see how he would get much done. Also, there is genunie concern that his candidacy would negatively effect House/Senate races, as well as local and state races. There is much more to consider about this guy other than how he can rally people’s emotions. Because he also rallies intense negative emotions as well.