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You are here: Home / Elections / Election 2012 / Newt Gingrich, Serving His Party

Newt Gingrich, Serving His Party

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(Mike Luckovich via GoComics.com)
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So, it appears that Newt Gingrich has been taking millions of dollars from the health-care industry in support of “Obamacare”-type insurance proposals:

A think tank founded by GOP presidential candidate Newt Gingrich collected at least $37 million over the past eight years from major health-care companies and industry groups, offering special access to the former House speaker and other perks, according to records and interviews.
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The Center for Health Transformation, which opened in 2003, brought in dues of as much as $200,000 per year from insurers and other health-care firms, offering some of them “access to Newt Gingrich” and “direct Newt interaction,” according to promotional materials. The biggest funders, including firms such as AstraZeneca, Blue Cross Blue Shield and Novo Nordisk, were also eligible to receive discounts on “products and workshops” from other Gingrich groups.
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The health center advocated, among other things, requiring that “anyone who earns more than $50,000 a year must purchase health insurance or post a bond,” a type of insurance mandate that has since become anathema to conservatives.
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The group also pushed proposals to build centralized electronic medical records and use such data to research treatment effectiveness, both central features of President Obama’s health-care reforms…

And he is not going to give back those “consulting historian” fees from Freddie Mac:

Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich, surging in recent polls, tonight distanced himself from payments that his consulting firm collected from Freddie Mac, which he has blasted on the campaign trail for its role in the national housing crisis.
__
“I didn’t take it,” Gingrich said after an event at Harvard University when asked about reports that he collected nearly $2 million from the agency.
__
He said the funds were paid to the Gingrich Group, his health care consulting firm, and demurred when asked if he would return the money to Freddie Mac, as he has called on President Obama to do. Obama has received campaign contributions from the agency.
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“[The funds] weren’t paid to me when I was a candidate,” Gingrich said.
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He said clients approached the group and its affiliate, The Center for Health Transformation, for advice from someone well-schooled in the ways of Washington, adding that he is sometimes referred to in news reports as the “smartest guy in the room.” He later said he was being “tongue-in-cheek” with that remark…

Also, he’s back on his mid-1990s hobbyhorse about greedy unions and their lazy-underclass-enabling child labor laws:

“You go out and talk to people, as I do, you go out and talk to people who are really successful in one generation,” he continued. “They all started their first job between nine and 14 years of age. They all were either selling newspapers, going door to door, they were doing something, they were washing cars.”

I’m expecting Newt to revive his “Children from low-income families should be put into orphanages where they’ll learn proper work habits and decent social behavior” proposal by next Tuesday, so that Limbaugh can funnel it through the Wingnut Welfare Wurlitzer in time to spoil more family Thanksgiving dinners.

Why haven’t the GOP moneymasters muzzled Gingrich, if they’re actually interested in winning the White House in 2012? Jon Chait at NYMag‘s Daily Intel runs the odds:

… At one level, it seems completely insane to not nominate Romney. Yet there is a logic to it. The worst thing that can happen to you as a party is for your president to compromise away your agenda, and party unity is far easier to organize in the opposition. The Republicans can block any plan to put a price on carbon emissions by President Obama. All the purists and all the party loyalists will vote as a block to stop it.
__
But suppose President Romney decides he wants to tackle cap and trade? He’ll split the party between purists, who will vote against Romney’s climate plan, and loyalists, who would be happy to vote for a Romney-endorsed plan, which they would oppose if put forward by Obama. And then support for cap and trade will be marginalized as a position, just as opposing any Medicare drug benefit was marginalized after George W. Bush supported it. In the long run, keeping your party together is more important than winning. You can always come back from a loss, but you can’t come back from apostasy. Another way to put that is, as a liberal, I’d much rather have a Republican president dedicated to a flat tax than a Democratic president dedicated to a flat tax.
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Now, the tricky thing with Gingrich is that he is not exactly a perfect vehicle for right-wing purity. But if you view Gingrich’s positions as a graph, with erratic spikes to the left (support cap and trade!) and to the right (fight the secular socialist machine!), the general thrust is still one of maximal partisan conflict. If I’m a Republican, I worry a lot less about Gingrich selling me out than Romney selling me out.

The calculus is that Romney has all the money he needs — an estimated quarter-trillion private fortune — so once Willard’s obtained the one thing his money has not yet been able to buy, he can’t be trusted to invariably choose what’s best for the Party over what’s best for his personal political career (as in “Romneybamacare”). But Gingrich is an established whore, with no private assets or abilities other than shilling for his Party masters, so the Koch brothers can feel secure that Newt will do as he’s paid, however degrading or undignified their requests.

Reader Interactions

170Comments

  8. 8.

    Cat Lady

    Keep it up Newt. Nothing says “President of the United States” like contempt, scorn and disdain for the 99%, and the 73% who aren’t ignorantly batshit insane. Who has a name of a reptile. Also.

  11. 11.

    Jenny

    As TBogg says, let’s not say or print anything critical of Newt, cuz we want him to get the nomination.

  14. 14.

    Hunter Gathers

    Chait proceeds from a false presumption – that a President Mittens will do anything that even carries a hint of being able to piss off the teabaggers. If he gets in, they will own his ass. Romney doing cap and trade? Get fucking real. Within Mitten’s first month in office he’ll sign bills that destroy the social safety net, outlaw abortion, put an Arizona style immigration policy into effect nationally and get the war drums started with Iran. And the conservative movement will still hate his fucking guts. Idiots like Chait (and few other left-of-center commentators) are making the argument that a Romney administration won’t be a complete disaster. Mittens is the most dangerous candidate the GOP has. Anybody who has flip-flopped on so many issues like Romney has would be completely beholden to the group that ‘got him there’. And that group just happens to be the teabaggers. And since Mittens is so desperate to be loved by any of the right wing factions, he’ll dace to their fucking tune any time they order him to. And there would be no stopping him either. The first chance that he gets, the human shit-stain known as Mitch McConnell will blow up the filibuster (a Romney win will also mean the GOP has at least 50 votes in the Senate, and a majority in the House), and will try to pass as many far-right bills as he can muster. And Mittens will sign them all, lest he draw the ire of his teabagger puppet masters. He is the most dangerous candidate they have, because he is the most gutless piece of shit ever to walk this Earth.

  15. 15.

    Bootlegger

    I heard Charles Kraut-whatever saying that Newt had too many “heresies” to win the nomination. He must have used that word a dozen times in the two-minute talking head piece. Atta boy, drive that orthodoxy bus right off the cliff.

  17. 17.

    Cat Lady

    @Jenny:

    No, it’s about pissing liberals off so like the children they are, if conservatives see us saying OH NOES NOT NEWT!ELEVENTY! they’re more likely to support him. Remember how we were all so “afraid” of Palin? Yeah. We’re afraid of Newt like that, also too.

  19. 19.

    Mark S.

    Why the fuck were people paying Newt that much money? Was he that influential in the twelve years since he lost his Speaker job? To put it another way, if in the last ten years, you had some legislation you wanted passed (or killed), would you throw a bunch of money at Newt? I could think of a thousand better places to spend it.

    Chait has a point. When I wade through the comments at conservative sites, I’m kind of taken aback by how much they hate Willard. I get the impression that many of them would rather have four more years of Obama than a potential eight years of President Mitt. There’s that much venom.

  22. 22.

    jl

    There was a GOP debate tonight?

    Well too bad for us paleo liberals caught in conventional thinking. Newt showed his stuff as an historian, world famous university scholar, innovative thinker willing to out of the box:

    Gingrich Calls For Law Invalidating Roe v. Wade

    IOWA GOP DEBATE — Newt Gingrich told the audience at the FAMiLY Leader debate in Iowa that Congress should pass a law stating “personhood begins at conception,” which he said would invalidate Roe v. Wade.

    http://livewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/updates/1995

  24. 24.

    Baud

    @Mark S.:

    than a potential eight years of President Mitt.

    That’s the key. Whoever they choose now will be their nominee in 2016. Another thing to consider, there are a lot of GOP bigwigs who sat out this time in hopes of competing in 2016. How strongly do you think they will fight to get the nominee elected this time around?

  25. 25.

    JPL

    When Newt was my rep..I campaigned against him and his goons threw eggs at me. It never dawned on me to save the egg shells becauses they could have been collector items.
    Is it me or does callista look like the perfect Stepford wife?

  26. 26.

    Little Boots

    wait, you campaigned against him? so you must have some insight? what the hell is up with that bitch?

  28. 28.

    jl

    @JPL: You do not know your market. Throw some new ones and sell them as replicas.

    Sure, you won’t get as a high mark up as you would with some snooty egghead expert at antique roadshow, but you will make it up on volume.

    Might want an offer to send them out out on a genuine souvenir Newt plate for for a few extra bucks.

  29. 29.

    Samara Morgan

    @Mark S.: Focus on the Family is choosing the candidate right now.
    And I bet it wont be one of those damned elite mormon cultists.

  33. 33.

    jl

    @Samara Morgan: Thanks for the link. Pretty colored leaves there. I clicked on it because I am stupid. Thank goodness the thing is over. So what I got was more nice pretty autumn leaves, which was nice.

    I daydreamed for a moment about a nice autumn trip through New England B and Bs, with just enough snow at the end for a day on the slopes at some luxe and rustic Vermont resort.

    Best GOP debate EVER!

  38. 38.

    Raven

    @JPL: It was but it was a beautiful day and after what they went through early in the year it was really fun at the end. I got all deep and reflective walking home realizing how lucky I am to live here.
    ‘
    eta, we’re just about packed and heading for the great fishing grounds at O dark hundred.

  43. 43.

    Raven

    @JPL: Thanks, the energizer bunny just collapsed after a crazy day in the garden and the a cleaning frenzy while packing!

  45. 45.

    Linda

    O.K., he has the purity to excite the base, but he’s still an embarassing retread from a long-ago period, like parachute pants or a mullet. His own peeps in Congress had enough of his shit in the 90s and threw him overboard. That conservatives like Kathleen Parker see him as the Great Intellectual Hope shows how rock bottom the Republicans have sunk in both intellectual firepower and basic sanity.

  49. 49.

    burnspbesq

    @Raven:

    10 yard penalty on Oregon for a “bear hug”!

    If the guy wants to tackle people, he should be playing defense.

  50. 50.

    Samara Morgan

    @Little Boots: all we have to do is GOTV.
    90% of blacks vote democratic, and hispanics vote party over race.

    these data portend a deepening electoral problem for Republicans leading into 2012. Hispanics continue to grow as a share of the population and of the citizen population of voting age, and over the past decade their participation in elections has jumped dramatically. At a time when whites are expressing greater ambivalence toward both parties, Hispanics are developing stronger attachments to the Democrats, to the point where Democratic partisanship is now even stronger among Hispanics than their desire to elect Hispanics to Congress.

    if blacks and hispanics vote in the same percentages as 2008, the GOP nominee will need an impossible 65% of the white vote to beat Obama.
    Even Reagan only got 60%.

    but dont get complacent.
    volunteer, do GOTV.
    occupy the electorate. :)

  51. 51.

    Seebach

    @Samara Morgan: I will never understand why the GOP decided to alienate hispanics for white racists.

    GW Bush and Karl Rove worked really hard, and it could have been very dire.

  54. 54.

    John O

    Newt as a the nominee would provide an almost perfect contrast with Obama, and we’d find out pretty quick where we stood as a country.

  59. 59.

    The Dangerman

    Uncle Unctuous won’t last very long; I don’t know who’s next in line for this Republican version of speed dating for the nomination, but Newt’s rise to the top won’t last long.

  60. 60.

    xian

    @John O: psychologically, I’d love a retread of 2008’s “old white-haired blowhard white guy vs. young cool smart charismatic black guy” campaign.

  64. 64.

    Baud

    @The Dangerman: I don’t know. Newt is one of the few candidates that can appeal to both the social conservatives and the money men. And they are running out of viable notRomneys.

  65. 65.

    Seebach

    The chancellor is reporting that she is trapped inside the building, but the students have a clear path for her to take. It just means facing them, which she refuses to do.

  66. 66.

    Citizen_X

    @Raven:

    10 yard penalty on Oregon for a “bear hug”!

    …if it were Penn State, they wouldn’t apply the penalty for another ten years!

    Thanks folks, I’ll be here all week. Remember to tip your waitress!

  71. 71.

    Samara Morgan

    Heres something sweet from the twitter machine.

    All OWS Working Groups and Autonomous Beings,
    Tomorrow is a historic day! Elders from the Civil Right’s Movement will be sharing the torch of social justice and equality with our movement, a symbolic act by which they recognize OWS as the transformative movement of the 21st Century. “We see Occupy Wall Street as a continuation, a deepening and expansion of the determination of the diverse peoples of our nation to transform our country into a more democratic, equitable, just, and compassionate society,” (excerpt from the statement of solidarity by the Council of Elders to be read at each of the Occupy encampments). By bringing their voices to the Occupy Wall Street movement, the elders will be addressing a litany of social grievances, including poverty, mass incarceration, and what they call a culture of war and violence.

    TOMORROW, SUNDAY:

    * 3:30pm, Liberty Square: Interfaith Service lead by the Elder Council at Liberty Square. They’ll symbolically pass the torch of hope and social justice to OWS.
    * 5:30pm, Judson Church: Conversation between the Elder Council members and OWS at Judson Memorial Church. Open to the general public – discussing space, liberation and race.
    * 7:00-7:30pm, march: Gathering at Washington Square Park for a candle light vigil march to Duarte Park. There will be donuts, coffee and some actions ;)

    On the heels of the 17th National Action Day, tomorrow Sunday will be a day of non-violent, spiritual and powerful gathering of all of us with those who stand in solidarity with us.

    Occupy to Liberate; Occupy to Awaken; Occupy to Empower; We lost Zuccotti but we haven’t lost Liberty; Rise and Reclaim!

    +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

    MEDIA RELEASE FROM THE ELDER COUNCIL:

    Elders from Across the Nation Declare Solidarity with the Occupy Movement

  72. 72.

    sullyVan

    What about “Occupy the Police State”?
    Did you see the numbers in Tahrir Square?
    Thats when you can effect policy, or mass murder.

  74. 74.

    J. Michael Neal

    Good weekend for the Gophers. New Hampshire may be a pretty good team with some experience and a couple more recruiting classes. They played us really hard and well for the first period last night, but as soon as the puck started going into the net, they fell apart. The last five minutes of the second period last night may have been the most lopsided stretch of hockey I’ve ever seen. Amanda Kessel looked sheepish after her third goal of the night. The final scores were 11-0 and 6-1.

    Next week, we’re at Harvard and I’d love to drop a big lead weight on the Pairwise Rankings for the whole ECAC. They’ll also be the first games all season I won’t attend.

  84. 84.

    sfinny

    @J. Michael Neal: This is Uncle Joe who is rescue cat from 2004. This is the first camera that I’ve owned in twenty years so the picture is not so great. And I interrupted a thread on much more important topic but I was trying out the whole picture thing.

  85. 85.

    sullyVan

    Comrade Luke,
    If your intent is to see only opinions you agree with, or are likely to have sympathy for, why come to a Internet Blog?
    The purpose of we are the 99% is to allow ALL voices to be heard. You clearly are part of the problem, and not interested in solutions to overcoming prejudices.
    Hopefully you can overcome these by shoving your PIE Filter up your arse.

  86. 86.

    sfinny

    @Steeplejack: I was worried more about the fact that his fangs showed than the aspect. He is upside down because I shot him from an odd angle. Other right side up pictures are available.

  91. 91.

    Yutsano

    @Steeplejack: Mine is totally out of whack. Every time I see this thread title I see little Republicans in suits sitting on crackers topped with a dollop of creme fraiche and Newt eagerly munching them. I never said I was quite right in the head. :)

  94. 94.

    xian

    @sullyVan: why, because Internet Blogs are the best blogs of them all!

    also, too, there’s a difference between people disagreeing and debating and barely functional morons pasting in nonresponsive talking points and foaming at the mouth.

  99. 99.

    jl

    Rant follows.

    Just back from looking for Thanksgiving swag for table decorations.

    What has happened to Thanksgiving? It has disappeared from the stores. Finally found some fold out turkey table decorations. But, no Pilgrim hats, no blunderbusses, no cornucopias. No cornucopias! I see tacky cheap cornucopias all the time, but not now. Why (because they have pulled them off the shelves, maliciously, to wreck Thanksgiving!).

    If we lose our Puritan heritage, soon the stores will be open late, women will be able to vote, pagan sporting contests will crowd out church on the Sabbath. Then… fornication in the streets. People will stop taking baths.

    I hope Fox talks about the War on Thanksgiving. Newt is on a loss of traditional family values jag, which I always enjoy from him. Hope he soon points out this dire threat, and points out its intersecting implications cutting through multiple levels.

  100. 100.

    Steeplejack

    @Yutsano:

    I’m not cranky! I thought maybe I sounded cranky, or at least not humorous, and I was making a slight (and apparently not humorous) joke about that.

    And I hate M&Ms in cookies. Now I am cranky.

  102. 102.

    Suffern ACE

    @Yutsano: I don’t much like Newt, but him being in the press all the time does make me feel young again. He’s talking the same crap he talked 20 years ago. The only thing that’s changed is the number of ex wives he wants you to ignore. Beyond that, I’m 25 again. Almost gives me the gumption to go out to a bar until closing time.

  103. 103.

    Mark S.

    Bye-bye Ducks. Oklahoma’s in a lot of trouble too. Crazy week of upsets.

    Looks like LSU-Alabama rematch. I’ve been hearing a lot of whining about that on sports radio lately.

  104. 104.

    jl

    @Yutsano:

    “Get any job that teaches you to stay all day even if you are in a fight with your girlfriend.”

    Newt, being one of the hyperboreans, one of the Overmen, beyond good and evil, has not lived according the laws of God Nature and Decent Society that are ordained and necessary for the lesser people.

    So, he is doing it wrong and making mistakes. He should have said

    “Get any job that teaches you to stay all day and earn enough money to marry your virginal high school sweetheart, and never even think of indulging in immoral irresponsible bad things.”

    And why does Newt have the concept ‘girlfriend’ on his mind? Thinking of another trade in if he doesn’t win? Watch his wife next time she is up there with him, for clues.

  105. 105.

    The Dangerman

    Ugh; are we really going to get LSU and Alabama?

    Hold on, Oklahoma making a move here. Save us, Sooners!

  108. 108.

    Yutsano

    @jl:

    And why does Newt have the concept ‘girlfriend’ on his mind? Thinking of another trade in if he doesn’t win?

    Well Callista is running out of skin to stretch on her face…

  109. 109.

    MikeJ

    @The Dangerman:

    Hold on, Oklahoma making a move here. Save us, Sooners!

    I don’t care one way or the other about the state of Oklahoma, but it’s cool that they named their team after illegal immigrants.

  110. 110.

    burnspbesq

    @MikeJ:

    Too bad cheaters get a chance to wipe other people out of the good bowls when they aren’t allowed to go.

    Would you like some cheese with that whine?

  111. 111.

    burnspbesq

    @The Dangerman:

    Ugh; are we really going to get LSU and Alabama?

    January 9 is a Monday. There will be plenty of good college basketball games to watch that night.

    Boycott the BCS!

  113. 113.

    JCT

    @Yutsano: Ain’t that the truth. Have you seen pics of her from when she was first dating Newt? It’s astonishing.

    She is only 45, but she looks like she is 55 trying to look 35. What a fucking mess.

  114. 114.

    Yutsano

    @JCT: Also given Newt’s past history she’s coming up on her expiration date. The thing is I think she knows this, and that’s why she has barely said a thing all campaign long. She knows if she even tries to make any sort of noise she’s ex number 3. Of course Newt is a papist now, so he can’t get a divorce. But I bet he could buy himself a nice annulment with the right bishop.

    EDIT: OK is going for two?? DANGER WILL ROBINSON!!

    EDIT 2: Never mind. All tied up.

  115. 115.

    MikeJ

    @burnspbesq: Meh. I have no love for Orygun. I just don’t understand why a team that was found to be cheating gets to play at all. Make them stay in their room with no Xbox until they’ve learned to play nice.

  116. 116.

    jl

    @JCT:

    “is only 45, but she looks like she is 55 trying to look 35. What a fucking mess.”

    That seems to be the ideal of beauty among the middle aged corporate media and political power set. For the men, it is more like “only 55, looks like 65, trying to look 45”.

    The rich and powerful are different from you and me. IMHO, too much money for high price booze, which does that to you.

  118. 118.

    AA+ Bonds

    Newt Gingrich’s rise in polls is proof that the Republicans aren’t able to perceive what other people like anymore. Every day that goes by without a clear Romney victory diminishes their chances in the general election against the President.

  122. 122.

    AA+ Bonds

    @jl:

    Look, I’m going to put this as primly as possible: they’re vain, they’re rich, they’re insecure, and thus, they’re surgery addicts.

  125. 125.

    burnspbesq

    And Oklahoma can’t be bothered to pick up the ball on the ensuing kickoff. Baylor beats OU for the first time ever.

    What an awesome playoff we would be looking at. Le sigh.

  126. 126.

    AA+ Bonds

    @Hunter Gathers:

    Chait proceeds from a false presumption – that a President Mittens will do anything that even carries a hint of being able to piss off the teabaggers. If he gets in, they will own his ass. Romney doing cap and trade? Get fucking real. Within Mitten’s first month in office he’ll sign bills that destroy the social safety net, outlaw abortion, put an Arizona style immigration policy into effect nationally and get the war drums started with Iran. And the conservative movement will still hate his fucking guts. Idiots like Chait (and few other left-of-center commentators) are making the argument that a Romney administration won’t be a complete disaster. Mittens is the most dangerous candidate the GOP has. Anybody who has flip-flopped on so many issues like Romney has would be completely beholden to the group that ‘got him there’. And that group just happens to be the teabaggers. And since Mittens is so desperate to be loved by any of the right wing factions, he’ll dace to their fucking tune any time they order him to. And there would be no stopping him either. The first chance that he gets, the human shit-stain known as Mitch McConnell will blow up the filibuster (a Romney win will also mean the GOP has at least 50 votes in the Senate, and a majority in the House), and will try to pass as many far-right bills as he can muster. And Mittens will sign them all, lest he draw the ire of his teabagger puppet masters. He is the most dangerous candidate they have, because he is the most gutless piece of shit ever to walk this Earth.

    ^ Reproducing the best post in this thread

  128. 128.

    suzanne

    @Jenny:

    As TBogg says, let’s not say or print anything critical of Newt, cuz we want him to get the nomination.

    We do? Why?
    I’m still pulling for Bachmann. I love the crazy she brings. Newt is nowhere near as funny.

  130. 130.

    Yutsano

    @suzanne: Bachmann past her sell-by date unfortunately. Plus there is no way the Republicans can sell a woman as head of their party and country.

    (note the order, it’s important.)

  131. 131.

    NR

    The worst thing that can happen to you as a party is for your president to compromise away your agenda,

    So true. Just like Obama’s been doing for the past three years.

  132. 132.

    suzanne

    @Yutsano: Bachmann is the FourLoko of the GOP stable. Totally insane and idiotic, with the fervor of The True Believer, and yet still amusing to watch.

  134. 134.

    mamayaga

    @The Dangerman:

    She’s toast.

    That was my thought, too. The students’ tactic is brilliant — make her take a walk of shame past their silent stares. She is unable to fully hold up her head and doesn’t dare look directly at them. The body language says it all.

  135. 135.

    Steeplejack

    Saturday night at Balloon Juice, and all we’ve got is a four-hour-old Newt thread?! What a wretched state of affairs.

  136. 136.

    The Dangerman

    @mamayaga:

    The body language says it all.

    The only staff at that campus with assholes puckered tighter than hers are in the Foundation; they are under a TON of pressure to get money from Alumni, the locals, etc., and that spigot just ran dry.

    Well done, UC Davis students.

  137. 137.

    Yutsano

    @NR: Hillary lost. Get over it. She’s an awesome SOS. I hope she enjoys retirement afterwards.

    @suzanne: Well the child has her own fervent faith in St Julian. I find it remarkable she finds him more infallible than the Prophet.

    @Steeplejack: I threw out a bat-signal to ABL. Might have to wait to see if it was effective here soon.

  138. 138.

    bin Lurkin'

    I heard this was the students’ chant while Katehi was in the building..

    “We won’t harm your property, we won’t harm your person, and we have pizza!”

  139. 139.

    suzanne

    @Yutsano:

    Well the child has her own fervent faith in St Julian.

    Oh, I know. It’s kind of funny. Her unswerving adoration of authority figures explains why she used to be a Republican. Well, that and the white privilege.

  141. 141.

    Yutsano

    @suzanne:

    why she used to be a Republican

    What’s this used to be shit white woman? :)

    She’s an appealing to authority overprivileged white girl. That stink is hard to wash off. I’ll bet you a beer she doesn’t wear hijab.

  143. 143.

    The Dangerman

    @Little Boots:

    the revolution has begun

    What’s truly amazing in some of those Davis videos are the number of iPhones, iPads, etc., recording the events. Not just a few of them; seemed like scores of them. Whomever said it was right; the revolution won’t be televised, it will be Youtubed…

    …and instantaneously. Anyplace. When Qaddafy left us a few weeks back, the video was up in a few hours.

    Really quite amazing.

  147. 147.

    bin Lurkin'

    I see the possibility of winning for the first time in a very long time.

    The students at UC Davis have done the 99% proud to the point I have tears and chills watching that video just like I did the other video.

  148. 148.

    The Dangerman

    @Little Boots:

    this country has turned a corner.

    It will be a very long road prior to any turns.

    Sadly, nobody’s winning; lot of people losing, however.

  149. 149.

    suzanne

    @Yutsano:

    I’ll bet you a beer she doesn’t wear hijab.

    I bet she has problems with the not-drinking-alcohol part, too.

    @Mark S.: Maybe. He just seems to have a marginally better handle on reality than she does, though I agree his religious views are equally heinous. I just get the feeling that Michele honestly does not know that the sky is blue sometimes.

  155. 155.

    Suffern ACE

    @Little Boots: If I’m an elite, I’m not worried until I start to hear things like “You know those well-paid pseudo liberal clowns you’ve paid to keep us entertained? Well fuck them, too.” or “Since we can’t get your money out of this government, we’re setting up our own. Current elite need not apply.”

  156. 156.

    Brother Shotgun of Sweet Reason

    @Little Boots: I’ve been here before, I’ve thought the same thing, around 1968. Don’t get your hopes up that we’re winning. It could all go to shit in a heartbeat.

    That being said, keep fighting.

  157. 157.

    hitchhiker

    I hope Newt stays in the spotlight long enough to come up with more like this:

    “If combat means living in a ditch, females have biological problems staying in a ditch for 30 days because they get infections, and they don’t have upper-body strength. I mean, some do, but they’re relatively rare. On the other hand, men are basically little piglets — you drop them in the ditch, they roll around in it, doesn’t matter, you know.”

    The guy is a gold mine of stupid.

  159. 159.

    Suffern ACE

    @hitchhiker: Yet so few of the piglets who ended up ruling the country from the vietnam generation were eager to go and roll in the mud. Funny how that worked out.

  160. 160.

    Calouste

    @hitchhiker:

    Someone please notify Newt of the end of the First World War. That brilliant historian that he is seems to have missed it.

    Since then, combat has meant living in a ditch about as often as anything Newt says has meant sense.

  161. 161.

    Joey Maloney

    @Little Boots: I think that unless there are some truly heroic registration and GOTV efforts in the face of the many new state-level voter suppression laws, we’re going to wake up on November 7th next year to some very bitter medicine.

    It’s Florida 2000 times twenty-some out there.

  162. 162.

    virginia

    Yeah, Newt, because America really really loves you. And we really really need you. And we want you more than you can possibly imagine.

    The more you talk, Newt, the hotter it gets. Because you, like the Ataturk you adore, are an original thinker — and a public intellectual.

    I wonder what it would be like to crawl into the sack with this guy. He’s such an ass.

  163. 163.

    Samara Morgan

    @suzanne: what do you care if i cover or drink? i dont give a shit about how you dress or if you drink.
    you are just trying to adhom me because what i say makes you uncomfortable.
    Because what i say is true.
    @bin Lurkin’: the joint civil rights march today is a natural progression. And so will activism redirecting to GOTV as the election nears.

    Coming soon to a democracy near you– occupy the electorate.
    That is the meaning of the 99%, occupy the electorate.

    Look what is happening in Japan, for example.
    Occupy Tokyo

  164. 164.

    Samara Morgan

    @virginia: please dont compare Newt to Ataturk.
    Newt is a third rate grifter, a carny barker for the GOP low-information base, a pseudo-intellectual pied piper for the intellectually clueless.

  167. 167.

    JR

    @Cat Lady: No, No!

    Newts are amphibians, not reptiles. They reproduce in our front door pond every spring, while the snakes and other reptiles lay eggs out in the forest under nice dry rocks.

    Newts have smooth moist skin, and most need a pretty moist environment or they dehydrate. Reptiles are often suited for life in the high desert, or on hillside micro-climates in rain shadows where it is much dryer than normal.

    Newts are sometimes slimy feeling, while reptiles are smooth and dry. Newts are mainly carnivorous, like reptiles,
    but newts mostly eat bugs and worms, because they often have little or no teeth.

    Newt the politician is more oily than moist, and is parasitic, he will eat anything put before him, or suck you dry, whichever is most convenient.

    Let’s do try to keep our biology straight!

  168. 168.

    Samara Morgan

    @suzanne: and also i do not care about your SES, except that it makes it possible for your husband to drive your child to a segregation academy.

  170. 170.

    virginia

    @Samara Morgan:

    Wasn’t comparing, Samara, and don’t disagree. It’s well known that Gingrich adores Ataturk and imagines himself another version of. He used to prattle on about it frequently in the 90s.

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