OMG no, Newt, say it ain't so! We're only "the first few minutes" into this hideous ordeal?

Newt pondering how to turn this nomination thing around?

"This is the first few minutes of the Super Bowl. I think it’s been a good three minutes for us. I think we've begun to lay out the themes that will work. I think we've seen Romney do his most intense negatives, and we now have had time to think through how to respond."

-- Newt Gingrich yesterday in Iowa, quoted by WaPo's
Amy Gardner in "Gingrich concedes Iowa, but not race

by Ken

We'll come back to this time that Newt has spent thinking through how to respond. I don't think we can talk about it now without considering the sea change in the rules of the game which Howie wrote about in his last post, "The Newtster -- Wiped Out By The Malefactors Of Great Wealth." I confess that I didn't really understand how completely the playing field has been altered post-Citizens United, especially now that the theoretical ban on coordination between PACs and campaigns has been reduced to the merest nuance of election law, unworthy of even the least significant effort at enforcement. Now there is essentially no limit to the ability of the people who control the money taps to make heard what they would like the American people to hear.

You would think that Newt would get this, considering that studendous brain he has. From Amy Gardner's WaPo report:

As one woman put it at a question-and-answer session in Ottumwa: “Your ideas are spectacular. Your brain is just inspiring.”

I can only surmise that our Newt has become so accustomed to raking in cash from the usual right-wing sources that he hasn't noticed yet what he's up against when it comes to the new-ear buying of political influence. It could be that he's thinking of it in terms of good old-fashioned corruption, judging (rightly) that he can at the very least go toe to toe with anyone in that department.

Well, Newt's access to election-buying cash is, at least for the moment, his problem, which brings us back to the question of what that "inspiring" brain of his has come up with as he heads into, um, Minute 4 of this Super Bowl. Reporter Gardner gives us a glimmering. There's some preliminary nonsense about "changing the narrative." (Newt told reporters, "Whatever I do tomorrow night will be a victory, because I’m still standing." Yeah, that sounds like a great narrative to me.) More to the point:

Gingrich has also altered his directive to stay positive. "No more" was his message on Monday, along with a preview of what's to come -- a brutal comparison of his conservative record with Romney’s history as a "Massachusetts moderate" who refused to sign the Contract With America and supported abortion rights.

Am I the only one who keeps wondering whatever happened to the sainted Ronald Reagan's 11th Commandment? I'm not necessarily objecting, mind you. Much of what's said in these Republicans' attacks on their fellow R's is of course true and apparently unknown to the benighted GOP "base." And even when the attacks are as nutty as the candidates themselves -- generally meaning when the victim is being accused of some real or imagined historical flight of sanity -- it's hard not to cheer them on as they tear each other to shreds.


The only thing it's not so good for is any hope of restoring even the rock-bottom level of sanity that once upon a time obtained in the national discourse. I don't want to go romancey here; it's not as if American political "dialogue" at any time in my memory has been credibly issue-based, with a reasoned clash of conflicting reality-based viewpoints. Still, there are limits (aren't there?). We have to be alarmed (don't we?) when, as I keep pointing out, the entire discussion not only abandons but jeers at any connection to reality or truth.

I've seen and heard a lot in a lifetime of campaign-watching. I've never heard anything like this. It's just a giant "Can you top this?" of misinformation, outright lies, and general craziness.

With, all the while, mainstream Democrats waiting in the wings muttering, "Me too, me too -- within a standard-deviant margin of error."

Well no, it doesn't seem to be in effect, does it?

RE. CAMPAIGN INSANITY: GEORGE PACKER CATCHES RICK
SANTORUM GOING TOTALLY NUTS, AND NOBODY NOTICING

Since I kind of took a swipe at The New Yorker's George Packer the other day over what seemed to me an uncomfortably political-insiderish defense of Christopher Hitchens, I want to call attention to an outstanding blogpost he's put up today, "Un-American Activities," which reminds me why he's in the hard core of political journalists I'm prepared to listen to seriously. Buried in a page A15 NYT report, "Santorum Seeks to Broaden His Appeal Beyond Evangelicals," Crazy Rick flat-out accused President Obama of "un-American activities" -- without any kind of elaboration or, apparently, any further attention from anyone.

This set George to reflecting on the level our political campaigns and campaign coverage have sunk to. If you can read his post now, you can save yourself the trouble of reading my post about it tomorrow.

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