(pic of Newt as Megamind courtesy of DonkeyHotey, via Flickr)
If I say that I want Newt Gingrich to win the GOP nomination because of the damage that he’d do to the Republican brand, does that make me a bad person?
The disgraced former Speaker of the House thinks that he is surging in South Carolina, with the likes of the quitting-in-the-middle-of-my-term-ex Governor of Alaska, Sarah Palin, saying that she’d vote for him if she were registered in that state.
All of this is coming from the fact that he managed to get a bunch of already shouting and cheering Republicans to come to their feet with a racially tinged dog whistle at the most recent GOP Goat Rodeo.
The line that President Obama is the most successful food stamp president and that he (Gingrich) would be the “paycheck” president is already an ad for the erstwhile Speaker and former Republican front runner.
While this might excite the party faithful (and Talk Radio asshats) it, like a lot of the things Newt tosses out, is based on a misunderstanding of the situation and, not to put too fine a point on it, lies.
Let’s start with the fact that this food stamps meme is quickly becoming the “welfare queens” line of this cycle. Like that race-baiting line from Ronald Reagan, this line started out being pointed at African Americans, when Newt said:
And so I’m prepared if the NAACP invites me, I’ll go to their convention and talk about why the African American community should demand paychecks and not be satisfied with food stamps
Now the faux historian has changed the tone a little, leaving out the overt assertion that it is primarily African Americans who are on food stamps (which is not true, more than 50% of the people on food assistance are white), he still has another problem, namely that most of the folks who are on food stamps are also bringing home a paycheck.
Leaving all that aside, we have to take a look at the whole “paycheck” meme. For many Gingrich and the rest of the Republican field the mere fact of a paycheck from a job is the be all and end all of the jobs problem. They are uniformly against unionization, and would love to have more so-called “right to work” laws in place.
This has the effect of lowering wages for everyone, and so would do nothing to help the people who are working actually keep food on the table, which is the whole point of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program or SNAP (the actual name of the food stamp program).
Gingrich himself showed that this is indeed his plan, at the very same debate when he said:
"You could take one janitor and hire 30-some kids to work in the school for the price of one janitor,"
And that is the future of work, all those “paychecks” that Newt wants to be the president of. Somehow I think that is going to fail to resonate in disastrous ways if a miracle happens and he becomes the Republican nominee.
But the fun doesn’t end there. You see Newt has a real problem with the law. Not so much his ethical travails, but the fact that he as a supposed historian fails and disgraced Speaker fails to understand how the Federal Government works.
He has made two statements that show just how, well bat-shit insane he is willing to sound to appeal to the Republican base. The first was the idea of subpoenaing Supreme Court Justices and Federal Judges to testify in front of Congress if they don’t rule in a sufficiently conservative manner.
He even wants to abolish the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals because it is the most liberal Appeals panel in the United States. This completely ignores the separation of powers and the fact that all federal judges are lifetime appointees, so you would have to have some court for them to sit on.
Then there is the newest meme along these lines that he would put a political test for career employees in the Federal bureaucracy. He wants to fire those who are too liberal. This is where he really ought to have studied history a little better.
You see it used to be that way, back in the late 18th Century. When an administration changed hands they would clear out all the former employees and install loyalists throughout the government. It was a spoils system that led to massive corruption and inefficiencies.
There are now laws that prevent the firing of career employees at out various agencies. It was a huge part of the problem with Monica Goodling only hiring “Good Bushies” at DoJ. Once they were hired, even though it was done in an illegal fashion for political purposes, they could not be fired except for cause.
Newt seems to have forgotten that and is arguing to take us back to the Gilded Age where patronage was all the rage.
These a just a couple of examples of the kind of things that just fall from Gingrich’s mouth on a regular basis. He claims that he’d be the only one that could beat President Obama in a debate, but it is all predicated on the idea that Obama will, like the yahoos in the Republican base, just take Gingrich’s plans as workable or even legal.
Frankly, I am content to see any of the current Republicans get the nomination. Romney is a serial liar and flip-flopper whose economic plan is way, way, way to the right of George W. Bush and will easily be tied to the 1% who are not exactly the favorite of the nation at this point.
Santorum is a religious radical who will keep saying things that will piss off most of the nation, and especially the women voters that any candidate needs to win the White House.
Rick Perry is the living embodiment of the dopey son of Sheriff Buford T. Justice who Sally Fields left at the alter in Smokey and the Bandit.
Ron Paul, the Mad Elf of the Republican Party, will lose a lot of his luster as he has to continue to defend the ever growing number of racist statements in the news letters he published and profited from.
But for my money, for the really destruction of the Republican Party by driving the crazy in their base all the way up to 11, there is just no one else better than Newton Gingrich.
Does that make me a bad person?
The floor is yours.