(John Deering via GoComics.com)
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Per Brett Smiley at NYMag‘s Daily Intel:
The editorial board of the Union Leader, New Hampshire’s most influential paper, has stamped Newt Gingrich with its endorsement. The seal of approval is a big boost for Gingrich and a blow for GOP presidential contender Mitt Romney, who had been courting Union Leader officials with hopes of winning the paper’s backing, according to Politico.
“We are in critical need of the innovative, forward-looking strategy and positive leadership that Gingrich has shown he is capable of providing,” Union Leader publisher Joseph McQuaid wrote. “… Readers of the Union Leader and Sunday News know that we don’t back candidates based on popularity polls or big-shot backers. We look for conservatives of courage and conviction who are independent- minded, grounded in their core beliefs about this nation and its people, and best equipped for the job.”…
Takes a long genealogy of evil and years of advanced training to pack that much conserva-blather into a single sentence, Mr. McQuaid. Well played.
The good news for us here in the Reality-Based Community is that (a) this will sadden Millard ‘Witt’ Romney, which is always entertaining, and possibly damage the Romneybot’s standing in the Live-Free-or-Die-Trying State; and (b) when Newt fails to win the NH primary, it will damage the Union-Leader‘s “kingmaker” status, in which they’ve taken way too much noisy credit since kneecapping Ed Muskie with the help of Tricky Dick’s ratfvcking squad.
Even were Gingrich to succeed in stealing the NH primary from Willard — and there is a nascent movement to encourage NH Dems (such as there are) to cross party lines and vote for The Swollen Amphibian, not to mention the proud Free State Project proponents of Dr. Ron — he’ll never manage to keep his temper restrained and his mouth shut long enough to be more than a nuisance by the time of the Tampa convention. But anything that further damages the Republican “brand” is Good News for President Obama, and Newt is never more than a missed nap away from a spectacular on-camera meltdown.
ETA: Thanks to commentor MikeJ, via Rumproast, for Gawker‘s report on how much the endorsement confused Twitters.
gogol's wife
Can there really be a chance that Obama will lose to one of these guys? Sigh.
xian
yes, I mainly see this as a popcorn moment, with the occasional shiver about worst-case scenarios.
Violet
Last I heard, poll after poll shows women hate Newt. Even Republican women. If he’s the nominee it’s going to be challenging for him to do very well if women won’t vote for him.
MikeJ
When it comes to family values the Republicans want the guy with more wives than the mormon.
gbear
I always thought the state’s motto was ‘Live, Freeze and Die’.
So when do we start hearing the stories about Newt serving divorce papers on his wife while she was lying in a hospital bed with cancer? I want to hear why she had it coming.
Soonergrunt
This is exactly the kind of thing I was hoping for. Go ahead and endorse the guy who can’t win the general and damage the one guy who is kind of acceptable to the non-batshit amongst some of the rest of us.
David Koch
This kind of endorsement just doesn’t happen. It had to be coordinated by DHS and Obama.
Mnemosyne
@gbear:
Don’t forget the part where Newt refused to pay child support and the family’s church donated money so his ex-wife could keep paying the bills. After all, who among us doesn’t love a deadbeat dad?
Maude
@Violet:
Women don’t like him almost as much as his 2 ex wives don’t like him.
He is flavor of the month. He will put his foot in his mouth soon. Newtie is good at that, at least.
Gex
@MikeJ: Win.
MikeJ
Funny, funny, funny, via rumproast.
Violet
@Mnemosyne:
Do Newt’s ex-wives hate him or are they paid off and will keep quiet?
Another Newt favorite is how he was cheating on his wife with one of his staffers while calling for Clinton to be impeached for doing the same.
And while Newt may play Happily Married Man now, the wax figure that plays the role of his wife Calista isn’t going to win over a lot of women.
Bubblegum Tate
Gawker’s roundup of Twitter reaction to the endorsement is pretty funny.
Linda Featheringill
Is he really that volatile?
gbear
@ 8.Mnemosyne:
Hey, deadbeat dads win awards!
arguingwithsignposts
BWAHAHAHA!
I’m tempted to subscribe just so I can cancel my subscription.
Violet
@Maude:
There just isn’t a lot of time left for Newt to make a big gaffe that will push him out of contention. There are only two debates left and we’re in the middle of holiday season. People’s attention is elsewhere. The first primary is not long after New Years. Unless it’s egregious, he may just luck out with his timing.
RossInDetroit
@MikeJ:
From the Rumproast post:
I didn’t know they had such a terrible record. Sounds like their endorsement is more like a kiss of death.
Violet
@Bubblegum Tate:
Hilarious. People really are stupid sometimes.
Ben Cisco (mobile)
“The Swollen Amphibian” – well done.
arguingwithsignposts
@RossInDetroit: Newspaper endorsements, in general, are self-serving crap. There’s research to back that up.
Cacti
Mitt Romney would be a formidable candidate if anybody liked him.
Jewish Steel
So the child labor gaffe wasn’t gaffie enough?
Maude
@Violet:
Newt is known for his fauz pas. It doesn’t take him long to say something utterly newtie and go down the tubes. Remember the foxhole comment?
He humiliated his second wife Maryann. He pulled the rug out from under her and she was stuck with egg on her face in public.
Violet
@Jewish Steel:
Heavens no. Republicans want to repeal child labor laws and
makelet kids of any age work. Especially if they’re poor kids. Cheap labor.Cat Lady
This is gonna be great. The Northeast Republicans think they’re all so smart and shit and are going to tell the southern Jeebus humpers who’s really riding those dinosaurs to church. Popcorn!
Hungry Joe
What was once said of Sen. Phil Gramm (who doesn’t get nearly enough credit for the damage he’s done to this country) fits Newt as well: “Even his friends don’t like him.”
Chris
@Maude:
You mean his occasional flashes of actual insight, like when he says “people don’t like the Ryan Plan because they like them some Social Security and Medicare,” and all the wingnuts freak out on him because even what’s perfectly obvious to everyone else is taboo sorcery in Wingnutopia?
I like these faux pas. I’m really looking forward to him making more.
Anoniminous
Unexpected, to say the least.
With the four way tie in Iowa, VERY unfriendly ground in South Carolina, and now this it’s possible Willard could lose the first three GOP primaries. But unlikely. Romney has been polling in the 40s in New Hampshire since, like, forever and the only way Gingrich,currently polling ~14%, could take NH is as the Not-Romney Unity candidate.
Don’t over-estimate the power of the Union Leader. Only two of their candidates went on to win NH: Reagen (1980) and McCain (2008.)
Don’t underestimate the news either. Roughly 60% of GOP voters are still up in the air and it was about this time, last time, McCain started his rise in national polling, and the win. If Romney can’t get into the 30 percentile range, and stay there, Real Soon Now one has to start questioning his Front Runner status. IMO, one also needs to start questioning if there is a Front Runner.
Thor Heyerdahl
Newt the Slandermander?
jon
In that small state, they’re an Olag-Hai Publication.
I can go with the “able to move under the sun” part, but the “intelligent” portion seems to beg the old question: compared to what?
JGabriel
Union Leader publisher Joseph McQuaid:
… truly bug-fuck crazy. It’s not enough to say you’re against improving health care — you’ve got to be the kind of guy who left a wife who was battling cancer.
Twice.
‘Cause that shows commitment to your principles. Just leaving one wife at the operating table could happen to anyone. It takes two to show you’re serious.
And then seeking annulments so you can convert to Catholicism? And thinking that’ll help you win the Presidency?
That’s the kind of bug-fuck crazy we at the New Hampshire Union Leader can get behind like dogs in heat.
.
gnomedad
OT, we need leaders not readers!
Violet
@Maude:
No, I don’t remember Newt’s foxhole comment. I do know he makes gaffes regularly. And that he’s an ass. His treatment of his wives is appalling. It’s a lot of the reason why women don’t like him.
@Chris:
Didn’t he make one of those with a comment on immigration in a recent debate? Something about how you can’t deport millions of people who are here because their parents brought them here as kids.
Sal
Say Newt does win.
Then what?
PurpleGirl
I wanna be sedated. I’d lurv to have some of the drugs that MsQuaid must be having… I could use some delusions and pain-killers.
Violet
@Sal:
Win what? New Hampshire? The nomination? The Presidency? If it’s the first two, it could be a very interesting campaign season. There’s plenty of ammo on Newt and women do not like him and won’t like him more when they learn more about him. I don’t see how he can win the Presidency if women refuse to vote for him.
If he does somehow win the Presidency, the Apocalypse is upon us. Plan accordingly.
arguingwithsignposts
Well, as the announcer said “The Tebow Train continues to crank out W’s”
Truly, the end is nigh.
schrodinger's cat
His so called liberal stance on immigration is half baked and unworkable.
Tara the Antisocial Social Worker
I’m waiting for Romney to make a deceptive commercial, breathlessly warning that “Gingrich was endorsed by a union leader!”
Roy G.
It is shocking, but not surprising, that Newt would return to the scene of the crime, as he was the architect of the ‘Republican Revolution’ in the 90s which led our government into its current bugfuck dilemma. Fwiw, as much as Newt is a person of low moral character, I think there is more to be gained by attacking his record – such as pointing out all of his shady lobbying deals.
At any rate, we are treated to the spectacle of the Republican fiddlers dancing and prancing while Rome burns.
General Stuck
Then Mother Nature delivers the mother of all puke funnels. At least 40 days and nights raining down relentless buckets of bullshit. Then the clouds melt away for another term of Unicorns with funny ears. It’s all right there in The Book of Black Job.
MazeDancer
@Violet:
You are so right. Newt is repulsive to all people with working hearts and minds. But the 3 wives, the leaving the wife recovering from cancer (Even if she was his teacher when he was 16), the not paying alimony and child support. Mixed with the screaming asshole pompous creep only interested in hearing himself talk – not a girl’s dream.
While Mr. Obama’s thoughtful political positions appeal to many, the fact that he is married to a tall, smart, strong woman whom he obviously adores goes a long way with women.
Barack Obama is so very charming and likeable. Newt Gingrich is so very not.
priscianusjr
Violet
@MazeDancer:
And even his current wife Calista comes across like a wax figure of a robot Stepford wife. Add to that her open charge account at Tiffany’s and she’s not exactly someone women can relate to. The average woman is going to have a hard time accepting his callousness to his first two wives and his settling on Calista.
BD of MN
from OTB
’04 endorsement went to Bush…
shoutingattherain
@MazeDancer:
Yes. This. Exactly. Shout it from the rooftops.
Baud
I don’t recall ever seeing so much hoopla over a newspaper endorsement before.
arguingwithsignposts
@Baud: When the Chicago Tribune endorsed Obama in ’08, that was a big fucking deal.
Baud
@arguingwithsignposts: Vaguely recall it now that you mention it. Wasn’t that because it was the first Dem they endorsed in like forever?
Violet
@Baud:
Early primary state newspaper endorsements have always been a big deal, especially when the race is as up in the air as this one is. It’s so obvious Republicans want a Not Romney they can all rally behind, but there isn’t one. The newspaper is hoping that Newt! can be that candidate. He can’t, but if they can pretend to make him such, they’ll claim kingmaker status. That’s good PR for them.
arguingwithsignposts
@Baud: Yes, the first time ever, in fact.
Cliff in NH
Union Leader endorses Confederate! News at 11!!
Cliff in NH
assholes forgot what they are named for, fuck ’em all.
RossInDetroit
@Baud:
Not much other news on the Sunday after Thanksgiving. Not even a GOP debate today. That I’m aware of…
Sly
@BD of MN: And who else would a conservative Republican newspaper endorse for the Republican nomination for President besides the sitting conservative Republican president?
henqiguai
@gbear (#5):
Really? Dude, you live in Minnesota. M.I.N.N.E.S.O.T.A. America’s ice box. And you’re gonna talk smack about poor misguided New Hampshire?
Ken
@MazeDancer: 3 wives, the leaving the wife recovering from cancer … not paying alimony and child support… screaming asshole pompous creep only interested in hearing himself talk – not a girl’s dream.
Oh, that is so typical of women. Judging a candidate on such superficial qualities that have nothing to do with the office, instead of important ones. Like whether you’d want to sit down and have a beer with him.
(Do I need a smiley? I always worry people will take my jokes wrong.)
arguingwithsignposts
I wasn’t aware of the not paying child support thing. Anyone got a link?
MikeJ
@henqiguai: Does Minnesota have liquor stores in the interstate rest areas? (on 93 in Manchester, if memory serves.)
Lizzy L
I give Newt 6 weeks at the most to ride this bull, and then — who do we have left? Is it Ron Paul’s turn yet? (Even the crazy base backs away from Santorum.) How about they draft Grover Norquist? Rush Limbaugh? Anyone but Mitt…
RossInDetroit
@Lizzy L:
Once the primaries are over and the candidate is determined it will all look obvious in retrospect. But from this point of view I have less of a clue than ever before.
Villago Delenda Est
Ah, the coveted endorsement of the Manchester Beobachter.
You go, Pillsbury Dough Boy!
MikeJ
@Lizzy L: @Lizzy L: 6 weeks could be enough. We’re 37 days from the Iowa caucuses.
The trick is to be the Not Mitt when the voting starts.
Baud
@Lizzy L:
That’s the thing — they’re running out of warm bodies. I don’t see how Paul breaks is 10-15%, and while I rarely have good things to say about the GOP anymore, kudos to them for realizing that Santorum is a doofus. (Huntsman is persona non grata because of his time working for their Satan). As I see it, the notRomneys have to pick Newt or Perry, or bite the bullet and live with Romney.
Villago Delenda Est
@BD of MN:
I do believe they’re talking about actual, seriously contested primaries.
The ’84 primary endorsement obviously went to Reagan, who had, um, zero opposition.
Violet
@arguingwithsignposts:
Link.
arguingwithsignposts
@Violet: Thanks. I knew the part about the cancer surgery, not the rest. Amazing that it hasn’t gotten more coverage.
gbear
@henqiguai: I’m laughing with them, not at them (which also helps keep me from crying).
henqiguai
@MikeJ (#60):
As far as I know, Minnesota’s liquor sales are still private enterprise. New Hampshire’s state package stores are actually pretty good. If you don’t live near the big city (Boston) access to decent wines can be problematic; the NH state stores can be pretty good.
But they are funny. Due to NH not having a sales tax and Massachusetts’ sales tax currently sitting at around 6.5%, NH has their state stores on all the major highways running south into Massachusetts; right on the border. For those little last minute items for after dinner and whatnot. I hear Massachusetts used to try to play tax enforcement games on the border by monitoring car license plates leaving the stores and heading right into Massachusetts; supposedly they would stop MA licensed cars and do a search for untaxed liquor purchases from the communist north.
Batocchio
Best post title of the day.
Schlemizel
I am more afraid of Newt than Willard. There is a thin slice of the festering swamp that will never forgive Willard for being a Mormon but they accept divorce from a Republican. Willard has those landing strip shoulders but Newt is labeled as an intellectual by the Kool Kids Klub and that will play well with them against Obama. Plus Willard is not a true conservative to the swamp, Newt is a founding father of the current movement.
Violet
@arguingwithsignposts:
Here’s a great Esquire article interviewing his second wife Marianne. It also has this:
It’s a relatively recent article. The whole thing is worth a read.
Suffern ACE
Typical of our mediocre times, the “Kingmaker” of New Hampshire has been correct mainly by accident, but resting on laurels of 40 years ago when it unmade Muskie. It’s kind of like referring to Murrow and Watergate as reasons why the US press should be thought of as great moral conscience of the country.
Schlemizel
@gbear:
Newts daughter came out this week saying that was not a true story. Its losing traction.
Villago Delenda Est
@Schlemizel:
Yeah, well Newt’s daughter is as accomplished a liar as he is.
Davis X. Machina
@Lizzy L: Buying Romneys, at the market….all you’ve got.
Schlemizel
@Villago Delenda Est:
No doubt but truth has not had much impact on Republicans in the last 30 years. Newt could have a parrot hold a presser saying he didn’t dump in 1st wife while she was in hospital fighting cancer & the librul media would report that there was doubt about the story. That he got his daughter from that union to lie for him makes it a sure winner for him.
Tom Q
Since I was around at the time, let me point out that the Union-Leader (then in the hands of the odious William Loeb) had serious impact in 1976. Gerry Ford was the sitting president and should have glided to nomination, but Reagan came within a percentage point of beating him in NH — the endorsement no doubt a big help — which set up a to-the-convention battle that crippled Ford for the general election. Also, as the link indicates, Pat Buchanan did win the NH primary in ’96, which didn’t keep him in the race long, but did establish Bob Dole’s weakness early on.
I assume Romney will still take NH, but if this endorsement encourages rally-around-Gingrich by the not-Romney crowd, it could make the victory narrow enough to be pyrrhic.
And I don’t see why people are so dismissive of Gingrich as the potential nominee. GOP primary voters don’t have real world standards; that which makes Gingrich (or Perry — the other, I agree, believable alternative to Romney) unthinkable to us makes him catnip to them. Either the primaries are going to swing behind a candidate the base deeply loathes (on a level way beyond McCain), or they’re going to yield a candidate many of us will view as a clown. I don’t see why one side of that proposition is any more likely to come about than the other.
vtr
Yes, NH Republicans belong to the extreme stupid wing of the party. In the 70s, Reublican Governor Meldrim Thompson wanted the N. H. Guard to have nuclear weapons. These people are far to the right of South Carolina.
vtr
Yes, NH Republicans belong to the extreme stupid wing of the party. In the 70s, Reublican Governor Meldrim Thompson wanted the N. H. Guard to have nuclear weapons. These people are far to the right of South Carolina.
vtr
Yes, NH Republicans belong to the extreme stupid wing of the party. In the 70s, Reublican Governor Meldrim Thompson wanted the N. H. Guard to have nuclear weapons. These people are far to the right of South Carolina.
Davis X. Machina
@vtr: New Hampshire really isn’t that New Hampshire any more. Only half of the state is reliably GOP any more, and it’s aging fast.
Look at who sits in the present, famously conservative NH lower house — in 15 years most of its GOP majority will be dead.
Cliff in NH
@Davis X. Machina:
Davis, those are not mutually exclusive statements.
Lizzy L
I think the truly red-meat conservatives will find Newt’s comments about undocumented immigrants unacceptable — though he can easily fix that, by making it clear that he doesn’t really want to treat immigrants with compassion. I believe he has also suggested that “marriage protection” should be left to the states. Most conservatives want DOMA to be a constitutional amendment. But he can fix that, too. He’s good at glib. Nevertheless, the man is just repulsive. The Paulites won’t support him.
Dr. Loveless
@Chris:
In the last debate he also expressed a slight sympathy for undocumented immigrants who’ve spent 25+ years building lives here. Really, if Newt doesn’t kick it up with the hating on Mexicans, he’s in big trouble.
rikyrah
I think this is hilarious, and has brought a smile to my face ever since I read it this morning.
handy
FEEL THE NEWTMENTUM!
GregB
Hunter S. Thompson once declared the Union Leader as the nation’s worst newspaper.
Considering it once had an editorial captioned:
Kissinger the Kike
I would say that Thompson was dead on. The non-Kool Aid kidz call it the Useless Liar.
JGabriel
@vtr:
AKA, the majority of the party.
.
catclub
no one has mentioned that Newt presently has no money. That means no campaign organization, no GOTV come primary time.
Certainly sounds like a formula for failure. I know the McCain 2007 campaign breakdown may be the gold standard, but Newt’s is even worse.
What do I know.
rikyrah
@catclub:
that is the genius of states like Iowa and NH – you don’t need a lot of money.
I will remind folks that Huckabee won Iowa with 10% of the money that Willard put in there in 2007….in Iowa, all you need is a dedicated bunch of ‘ believers’, and the other piece of news last week was that the Holy Rollers in Iowa got together for a ‘ secret meeting’, the topic of conversation being – how to stop Willard Romney. If Newt can get the Holy Rollers to choose him, money won’t matter in Iowa…and, if he does some appearances in NH, it won’t matter there either. Money doesn’t matter until Florida. That’s why the first few contests are so interesting – you need dedicated ‘ believers’ over money…because they will help you get out the other ‘ dedicated believers’.
Jay in Oregon
I’m still fascinated by the idea that, in order to brush up on his family-values cred after the multiple divorces, Gingrich converted to Catholicism.
I wonder what that thought process must have looked like?
Lojasmo
@henqiguai:
Only in January is minnesota’s average low colder than NH. In December, February, and March, NH has colder average lows. /pedant.
Herbal Infusion Bagger
oh please please please let Newt be the GOP nominee…
The GOP could kiss the soccer mom demographic goodbye, given how he’s treated his wives. Not to mention a lot of other female demographics.