You’re a mean one Mr. Grinch
You really are a heel.
You’re as cuddly as a cactus,
And as charming as an eel,
Mr. Grinch!
You’re a bad banana,
With a greasy black peel!
You’re a monster, Mr. Grinch!
Your heart’s an empty hole.
Your brain is full of spiders.
You’ve got garlic in your soul,
Mr. Grinch!
Well, that’s a pretty good beginning at describing how most conservatives feel about Newt Gingrich these days. More of that later. Of course, many of us felt this way before the 2012 GOP presidential primary began, and have been vindicated as Newt has once again shown his true self to the world.
There are probably zealot followers of Newt who are stacking the wood to burn me at the stake as I write this. But I have long since stopped with political politeness toward those in the GOP who claim conservatism, yet through their actions continue to set the conservative movement back. No one has done that more than Newt Gingrich.
As the time was coming around toward the primary, most conservatives longed to have a strong conservative candidate emerge as the one that we could get behind. Knowing that Massachusetts moderate Mitt Romney was the establishment’s pick, and that the media would be strongly behind him all the way; we desired for unity among conservatives so that Romney might be defeated.
One phrase that has been repeated over and over is “anyone but Romney.” It really didn’t seem like that tall of an order, and it really shouldn’t have been. On the heels of the tea party’s great successes in the 2010 primaries I fully expected for conservatives to rally at some point and send Mr. “Obamaneycare” into political retirement.
Early on the field was very crowded. Some of us conservatives were with Bachmann, others with Santorum, Cain, or Perry. But who would have ever thought that any conservatives would have rallied around Newt Gingrich of all possibilities? Considering that Newt last held office in 1999 and had a coup held against him in 1997 by the conservative wing of the GOP. Considering that Newt stepped down in shame after he led the GOP to the single greatest loss in Congress that ANY party in history had ever suffered in the 1998 midterm elections, who would have thought it?
I wouldn’t touch you
With a thirty-nine-and-a-half foot pole!
You’re a vile one, Mr. Grinch!
You have termites in your smile.
You have all the tender sweetness
Of a seasick crocodile,
Mr. Grinch!
Given the choice between the two of you,
I’d take the seasick crocodile!
You’re a foul one, Mr. Grinch!
You’re a nasty, wasty skunk!
Your heart is full of unwashed socks.
Your soul is full of gunk,
Mr. Grinch!
But slowly and surely the field narrowed as Cain dropped out due to scandal, then Bachmann after Iowa, and then Perry before South Carolina. Rick Santorum sailed almost totally under the radar until his surprise win in Iowa and seemed to be the clear conservative choice going forward. Newt finished a very distant 4th place in Iowa, and then 5th behind Santorum in New Hampshire. So going into South Carolina it would have seemed the better part of valor for Newt to have dropped out and helped consolidate the conservative “not- Romney” vote for Santorum. But it was not to be. In fact, Mr. 4th/5th place Gingrich was actually calling for Santorum to drop out and back him at that point. What arrogance!
Newt greatly benefited from the emotions of the moment surrounding the Charleston debate, and won South Carolina. Well ok, at that point Santorum, Romney, and Newt had each won 1 state, so each had a claim at staying in and fighting it out. In fact, it looked like Newt might just ride the wave of momentum from South Carolina on to the nomination. But then came Florida, where Newt, pandering to the NASA community literally promised the moon with his wild and wacky moon colony he promised to build before the end of his first term. Florida was a bust for Newt as Romney defeated him badly.
Then came Nevada where Newt finished another distant 2nd place, and afterwards gave an unprecedented speech blaming everyone but himself for his demise. But Nevada was actually the last state that Newt would finish as high as second place all the way until winning his home state of Georgia on Super Tuesday. Next it was Rick Santorum who surprised the world by sweeping all three states of Minnesota, Missouri and Colorado in one day. So at that point Santorum had won 4 states with Romney also having won 4. With Newt flailing, it seemed time for him to drop out and solidify the conservative vote behind the last conservative standing- Rick Santorum. But no, Newt promised his new “southern strategy” where he would concentrate on the southern states to stage his comeback.
The three words that best describe you
Are as follows, and I quote,
“Stink, stank, stunk!”
You’re a rotter, Mr. Grinch!
You’re the king of sinful sots!
Your heart’s a dead tomato,
Splotched with moldy, purple spots,
Mr. Grinch!
But Newt’s southern strategy also went bust as Santorum took Tennessee and Oklahoma on Super Tuesday. Then Santorum swept Alabama and Mississippi were Newt had campaigned heavily. Finally, Santorum took Louisiana with nearly 50% of the vote while Newt finished a distant third. So surely by then with Newt’s southern strategy having totally failed he would have seen the handwriting on the wall. Surely he would try and salvage what little respect he had left among conservatives by giving Santorum the benefit of a consolidated conservative “not-Romney” electorate as the primary calendar turned back towards Romney’s blue states.
Not so. Even with top conservative voices such as Richard Viguerie, and even Michael Reagan who had endorsed Newt now calling for him to step aside for the sake of conservatism, Newt’s massive ego would not let him. Newt even earned the name “Newt Perot.” He continued to vow to fight on until the convention in Tampa. It seemed fairly obvious to many of us all along, that Newt’s campaign had been nothing more than him dancing for the Puppet Master in order to help Romney by keeping the conservative vote split.
What’s very telling about this is that Newt has raised very little actual campaign money and is now at least $4.3 million in debt. Basically all of Newt’s big money came through his super pac - Winning Our Future. And almost all of the super pac money came from corrupt billionaire casino mogul Sheldon Adelson and his wife, a total of more than $20 million. Winning Our Future has raised a total of $23 million. Sources close to Adelson said as early on as mid February that Adelson was only funding Newt in order to help destroy Santorum’s chances of beating Romney. Further proof of that, is that Winning Our Future ran mostly anti-Santorum ads. In reality, if Newt truly was all about the conservative movement as he claims, he would have condemned the ads and focused his efforts on Romney instead of helping to destroy the only conservative candidate who had a real chance at defeating Romney. More on Adelson later.
Let’s look for a minute at Newt’s record in this primary contest:
Newt finished dead last in 21 of 36 states, which is dead last in over half of the states.
3rd place in 10 states. *3 of the 3rd place finishes came after Santorum was out of the race
2nd place in 5 states. *1 of the 2nd place finishes came after Santorum was out of the race
1st place in 2 states.
Newt has finished dead last in 4 more states than all his 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place finishes combined, and 1 2nd place and 3 3rd place finishes came after Santorum was out of the race.
Newt had a losing record with every other candidate.
Newt 4 Romney 32
Newt 4 Santorum 27
Newt 14 Paul 22
Every other candidate beat Newt more times than Newt beat them.
When even Ron Paul has beaten you 8 more times than you have beaten him, it’s a very sad thing. Continuing to lose to Paul should have been a wake up call for Newt to drop the heck out, but Newt will only follow where his ego leads him.
Let’s consider for a minute what would have happened if Newt wasn’t solely driven by ego. What if he was truly committed to the conservative movement and had gotten out before Super Tuesday? Well, it’s clear that would have meant that Santorum would have won the key state of Ohio, as well as Alaska, and Georgia in addition to the other 3 states he won on Super Tuesday. Santorum would have taken 6 of 11 states in one day leaving Romney with only 5 instead of the 7 he got. Think of the total game changing momentum that would have caused in Santorum’s favor. Then Santorum would have gone on to win Wisconsin as well. If Newt had dropped out when he really should have after New Hampshire, then Santorum would have also won South Carolina and could have dealt Romney an effective death blow in Romney’s home state of Michigan. That would have given Santorum 6 more states and lots more delegates, and denied Romney 5 states and many delegates.
The whole argument from the Newt camp was that his being in the race was helping defeat Romney by Newt getting delegates instead of Romney. But that argument is absurd because it’s a far more effective way to defeat an enemy by having one strong challenger instead of multiple weaker ones. This is especially true for the winner take all states like Wisconsin, because Newt prevented Santorum from even getting any delegates and allowed Romney to take them all. If Newt had dropped out before South Carolina, Santorum would have won at least 16 states instead of 11, and Romney only 15 instead of 18. If he had dropped out before Super Tuesday it would have been Santorum 14, Romney 16, (Newt 1). I will not even bother to get into how the delegate count would have gone.
Your soul is an apalling dump-heap,
Overflowing with the most disgraceful
assortment of deplorable rubbish imaginable,
Mangled-up in tangled-up knots!
You nauseate me, Mr. Grinch!
With a nauseous super naus!
You’re a crooked jerky jockey,
And you drive a crooked hoss,
Mr. Grinch!
You’re a three-decker sauerkraut
and toadstool sandwich,
With arsenic sauce!
As the process lingered on, it was becoming all about preventing Romney from getting to 1,144 delegates and allowing the convention in Tampa in August to be open and contested. But since Newt served as Romney’s wing man helping to destroy Santorum, we can all but rule out that possibility now. Romney will most likely coast onto his needed delegates and the nomination without a strong candidate such as Santorum to stop him. And no, Ron Paul is not a strong candidate. Ron Paul took on Romney one on one in Virginia due to no other candidates making the ballot, but Paul could only muster 40% of the vote. Paul hasn’t won a single state, though he has managed to take some extra delegates by hijacking delegate conventions in states like Minnesota and Missouri. But without winning at least 5 states neither Paul nor Newt one will be able to get their names on the ballot at the convention.
Newt has had to lay off one third of his campaign staff and is over $4 million in campaign debt. Even his flagship “The Gingrich Group” has filed for bankruptcy within the last few weeks, which is only one of at least a dozen such enterprises that Newt has led into bankruptcy over the last 30 years. But still Newt continued to flail around jousting at windmills.
After finishing dead last in 4 of 5 states on Tuesday, Newt has finally decided to drop out at long last. Though it is satisfying to see him admit defeat, it comes way too late to do have any real meaning or give any help to a fellow conservative such as Santorum. Had it come weeks or months earlier it would have certainly meant the defeat of Romney, and victory for a conservative.
To me the timing of Newt dropping out is very telling. He stayed in long enough to make certain Santorum was out, but had he dropped out then, it would have been obvious that he was the intentional spoiler. He continued to run a ghost campaign knowing that he would lose badly on Tuesday and then used that as the excuse to drop out. Adelson’s wife recently gave another $5 million to Newt’s super pac even though the Adelsons had changed their support over to Romney and Sheldon had stated that Newt was “at the end of his game” weeks ago.
The three headed snake of the GOP establishment – Sheldon Adelson, Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney
Even though Newt’s campaign was $4.3 million in debt, Winning Our Future made no plans to spend any of the $5 million in any way. It seems that the plan was/is for it to sit there; because once Newt is officially no longer a candidate he can use it as he pleases with one exception, – he cannot use it to pay off campaign debt by law. However, he can use it in any other way he pleases and can actually pay off the campaign debt in an indirect way. For instance, he could purchase $5 million in property and then sell it and use the profits to pay off the debt. He could also put it into one of his business ventures and then give himself a pay bonus and use it to pay the debt. The point here being that Newt has more money at his disposal than he has debt; and it was given to him by someone who was supporting Romney at the time it was given, and given by a person who knew that Newt was not going to be able to win or even continue in the race at that point.
There is no “smoking gun” that directly proves that Adelson was funding Newt as a means to help Romney, but speculation has been risng for quite a while. We know for sure out of Adelson’s own mouth that he wanted to help destroy Santorum. We also know that Adelson had long since given up on Newt and was backing Romney for weeks prior to giving additional millions to Newt. We also know that Adelson has said that he is pro-choice and socially liberal. It would stand to reason then that he would have interest in helping Romney because of Romney’s pro-choice and socially moderate stances.
Whether Adelson’s game plan all along was to help Romney, or if that became plan B for him is not 100% clear. But what is clear is that Adelson had his bets hedged. (What else would we expect from corrupt guy who has made billions from casinos?) I smell a rat and say that 2+2 = payoff…….
Newt Gingrich is a political has-been that never really was, and never will be. Unless a miracle happens between now and the convention, Newt will always be remembered as the one who cost conservatives the single most important election in modern times. He will be known as the “Grinch Who Stole Conservatism”. At least the Grinch who stole Christmas eventually saw the light and gave Christmas back to the people of Whoville. But Newt cannot give back the 2012 GOP nomination to conservatives. In fact, by ensuring Romney the nomination he may well have handed Obama his second term.
It’s important to point out that the people who supported Newt also bear a great deal of the blame in ruining conservative chances in 2012, especially those who call themselves “tea partiers.” As someone who has been part of the tea party movement from the beginning, I knew that Newt Gingrich was last candidate I should get behind. But many others ignored the warnings. They got caught up in a bloodlust to see Obama embarrassed in a debate and fed the troll, so to speak. They acted as co-conspirators with Newt in stealing conservatism, and they will share in whatever consequences the are to come.
Yes indeed, you’re a mean one……. Mr. GinGrinch!
By: Javan Browder
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