Newt Gingrich: What a GUY

I ordered a drink Friday night called the County Seat Cosmo, described on the menu as "smoother than a Dixiecrat running for a fourth term". While I got a good laugh - twice - I won't be laughing when GOP candidates start showing up in the South stirring the pot and throwing in those buzz words that, like dog whistles, only some Southerners can hear causing them to vote, in many cases, against their own self-interests and the best interests of others.

Newt Gingrich, who recently announced his candidacy for the presidency in 2012, has already made an appearance, making the following statements at a GOP dinner in Macon, Georgia (source) (source)

The 2012 presidential election is the most consequential since the 1860 race that elected Abraham Lincoln to the White House and was soon followed by the Civil War.

(Obama is ) the most successful food stamp president in modern American history.

(Obama's recent speech on immigration) very dishonest. This from a man who called Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor a racist.

Throw in a few "states' rights" here and there and how he can run a country without ever taking in any revenue (i.e., 'no taxes') and I imagine any audience who would even want to hear Gingrich would be eating out of his hands. Newt will have to wait a little while before he throws in God and values, considering his history. Although.... his personal life has never stopped him before.

He's a few of my other Newt favorites:

On his first wife, Jackie, his high school geometry teacher and seven years older:
Newt on why he wanted a divorce from Jackie: "She's not young enough or pretty enough to be the wife of a President. And besides, she has cancer."
Source: Katharine Q. Seelye. "Gingrich's Life: The Complications and Ideals." NYTimes.com 11/24/1994.

During April 1980, Newt and Jackie separated. They divorced in February 1981.

"The most notorious incident in Gingrich's marriage ... was when he cornered Jackie in her hospital room where she was recovering from uterine cancer surgery and insisted on discussing the terms of the divorce he was seeking. Shortly after that infamous encounter, Gingrich refused to pay his alimony and child-support payments. The First Baptist Church in his hometown had to take up a collection to support the family Gingrich had deserted. Six months after divorcing Jackie, Gingrich married a younger woman, Marianne, with whom he had been having an affair."

Source: Stephen Talbot. "Newt's Glass House." Salon.com. 8/28/1998.

"There's no question I've said to people that I made mistakes in my life, that I had to go to God for forgiveness and that I had to seek reconciliation," Gingrich said. "People have to decide whether at this stage in my life I have learned enough and matured enough, and I'm somebody they can trust. 
Source: "Newt Gingrich: I bring some scars with my life". Political Wires. 5/13/2011.

He's "matured", by his words? He is sixty-f**king-seven years old! He is an old white guy with old white guy  ideas. I say he has no way of becoming POTUS. Of course, I never, ever thought GWBush would make it either (which, of course, he didn't the first time without the intervention of the Supreme Court). 

And, don't forget, Newt's sister is a lesbian and advocate for GLBT rights. Here's an excerpt of a 2008 letter from sister to brother (read letter in its entirety here):

Even older Americans are turning their backs on the politics of fear and demagoguery that you and your cronies have perfected over the years.

This is a movement of the people that you most fear. It's a movement of progress -- and your words on FOX News only show how truly desperate you are to maintain control of a world that is changing before your very eyes.

Then again, we've seen these tactics before. We know how much the right likes to play political and cultural hardball, and then turn around and accuse us of lashing out first. You give a pass to a religious group -- one that looks down upon minorities and women -- when they use their money and membership roles to roll back the rights of others, and then you label us "fascists" when we fight back. You belittle the relationships of gay and lesbian couples, and yet somehow neglect to explain who anointed you the protector of "traditional" marriage. And, of course, you've also mastered taking the foolish actions of a few people and then indicting an entire population based on those mistakes. I fail to see how any of these patterns coincide with the values of "historic Christianity" you claim to champion.

Again, nothing new here. This is just more of the blatant hypocrisy we're used to hearing.

What really worries me is that you are always willing to use LGBT Americans as political weapons to further your ambitions. That's really so '90s, Newt. In this day and age, it's embarrassing to watch you talk like that. You should be more afraid of the new political climate in America, because, there is no place for you in it.

In other words, stop being a hater, big bro.

Newt. What a.... guy.