Friday, April 3, 2009

Here We Go...Again. Newt News.

Some bad things never seem to leave completely, and Newt Gingrich is one. I have thought for a long time that Newt might run in 2012, and he has not said he would not. Rather, he has said he will decide as the time draws nearer.

Clearly, there is no match in intellect between she from the north and Newt. Despite my dislike of everything Newt, he's got her hands down in this capacity as does the exorcist, anti-volcano-monitoring governor of Louisiana, Bobby Jindal, which says a lot about the strange folks mantled under the GOP elephant.

I swear, one just couldn't find a weirder bunch.

So, what is Newtie Boy doing now? Well, one of the things he is doing is pandering to the Christian right (of course!) again as reported by TPM:


"I think there's a clear to desire to replace the church with a bureaucracy, and to replace people's right to worship together with a government-dominated system," said Gingrich.

And what is driving this drastic move to a government-dominated bureaucracy? A decrease in tax deductions for churches from those making over $250K. A what does he use for any kind of proof this is the case? Well... nothing, actually.

All Newt did was put Christianity on the end of a hook and dangle it in front of folks on the Christian right that don't like President Obama, don't like taxes, and probably couldn't define socialism if their lives depended on it (though now Glen Beck, in a VERY weird and dangerous broadcast that you really should see, has said we are on our way to fascism, so I guess the socialism meme didn't work so well).

As I said, one couldn't find a weirder bunch and I didn't even include Coulter, O'Reilly or Buchanan!

Replacing she from the north as the keynote speaker at a big GOP spring dinner, Gingrich is stepping out again as the brains of the party (God help us all) warning that if the GOP doesn't get its act together there might be a viable third party in the mix.

A viable third party? I don't know whether to whistle dixie or laugh. Sure, the right wing could start their own Christian Dominionist Theocracy Party (with help from the likes of Howard Ahmanson and other funders) and run she from the north (though many don't like her because while she might have the right moral chops, she's dumb as dirt on issues), but that would leave a moderate GOP population with no leadership (same as the last eight years given the GOP moderates were pretty much driven from the party) . Viable? Hah!

So where is Newt heading with this? A populist party apparently built on some odd form of intellectual leadership where the lamb can lie down with the lions again? Seems so.

The problem is that those on the far right don't need no stinkin' intellectual. They just need a few nonsensical slogans to chant and a couple of sparky speeches and hey, they're in line! So how does Newt figure into that equation? Well, let's watch and see. He's not a populist leader and never has been so it will be interesting to see what he does with the teeming masses and their tea bags.

It should be entertaining. We'll need cases of popcorn because the infighting should be delicious to watch along with Newt roasting she from the north on an intellectual spit.