The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

What Does This Sentence Mean?

Posted on | January 22, 2012 | 125 Comments

“Base hostility will now be exacerbated by Mitt Romney’s backers now undoubtedly making a conscious effort to prop up Rick Santorum to shut down Newt Gingrich.”
— Erick Erickson, Red State

Last night I found myself talking to Caleb Howe, who said how much he hated the argument that a vote for Candidate X is actually a vote for Candidate Y. You see how Erickson deploys exactly that argument in claiming that supporters of Rick Santorum are closet Romneyites.

This would have been news to the Santorum supporters who gathered last night at the Citadel to hear the man they think should be the next president of the United States. There were a lot of home-schoolers and pro-lifers and national security hawks at the Santorum event, and I wonder what they would have made of arguments like this:

“People are mad as hell they are about to be stuck with another boring, moderate, uninspiring choice that has at best a 50/50 shot at losing to the worst president since Carter. They are flocking to Newt not because they think he’s a great guy, but because right now, he’s the only one fighting for conservatism . . .”
— Erick Erickson, Red State

Really? “The only one fighting for conservatism”? Somebody needs to tell this to Newt Gingrich, who praised Rick Santorum in his victory speech Saturday night. And somebody also needs to tell Rick Santorum, who released his Sunday and Monday campaign schedule for Florida a half-hour after the polls closed in South Carolina:

Sunday, January 22:

2:00pm ET:  Senator Santorum will hold a campaign rally at Wings Plus in Coral Springs, FL.
Location: Wings Plus
9880 West Sample Road
Coral Springs, FL

8:00pm ET: Senator Santorum will appear on “Huckabee” on FOX News.

Monday, January 23:

1:30pm ET: Senator Santorum will hold a “Faith, Family and Freedom” Town Hall in Lady Lake, FL.
Location: American Legion Hall
699 East Lady Lake Road
Lady Lake, FL

9:00pm ET:  Senator Santorum will participate in the NBC News/National Journal debate in Tampa, FL.
Location: University of South Florida
Tampa, FL

While nobody has appointed me the Omniscient Arbiter, authorized to write articles titled “What It Means,” I can summarize what one of Santorum’s supporters told me last night about what he expects: Newt and Mitt are going to attempt to destroy each other, and all the while Santorum will keep on campaigning, arguing that he is the “conviction conservative,” steadily accruing support from those conservatives who don’t like either Newt or Mitt.

The Santorum supporter who told me that is a fine young Christian man, and so I did not bluntly express to him what I see as the basic problem with the Gingrich campaign: Sooner or later, people will figure out that Newt is a selfish, arrogant asshole.

And people don’t like selfish, arrogant assholes.

Category: Election 2012, Fear and Loathing in South Carolina, Newt Gingrich, South Carolina

Comments

125 Responses to “What Does This Sentence Mean?”

  1. Anonymous
    January 22nd, 2012 @ 7:43 pm

    He was elected Speaker because he led the GOP to victory in ’94 by beating the Democrats’ skulls in using the Contract for America and the epidemic of scandals involving the Democrats. Some of us are old enough to remember that, and that the Old Bulls never forgave him (or Rush Limbaugh) for it.

  2. Anonymous
    January 22nd, 2012 @ 7:46 pm

    He shoots! He scores! XD

  3. ThePaganTemple
    January 22nd, 2012 @ 7:47 pm

    @Bob Belvedere this triumvirate can’t go on forever and if somebody has to cross the Rubicon it looks like its not going to be Rick Pompeius, and personally I’d prefer Newt Caesar to Mitt Crassus.

  4. ThePaganTemple
    January 22nd, 2012 @ 7:52 pm

    In a comment on another post Adjoran said that he hoped SC voters didn’t vote against Mitt because he’s a Mormon, seemingly hinting that may be why they did it. Of course left unexplained in that charge is why Mitt was so heavily favored in the polls to start out with. It’s not like the voters just discovered he was a Mormon over the last week.

  5. Finrod Felagund
    January 22nd, 2012 @ 8:18 pm

    If losing five seats in the House is getting reamed, then what happened to the Democrats in 2010?

  6. Finrod Felagund
    January 22nd, 2012 @ 8:24 pm

    Yeah well, blow me.
     

  7. Finrod Felagund
    January 22nd, 2012 @ 8:37 pm

    Believe it or don’t, but this is what Erickson is reporting now:

    I can confirm tonight from multiple sources that phone calls are in fact
    occurring between Republicans in Washington and among evangelical
    leaders to raise money for Rick Santorum rapidly.

    The sources tell me that this is not for a Santorum win, though the
    evangelicals I spoke to continue to hope it is possible. This is to
    stop Newt Gingrich. One evangelical leader I spoke to said, “If Newt
    wins, we won’t be able to make family values an issue in the general.”
    One lobbyist I spoke to said, “They [the GOP leaders in DC] are really
    nervous about Gingrich and they think he’d be a disaster. The best way
    to shut him down is to prop up Rick.”

    If this is true, are Santorum supporters comfortable with their candidate getting support from the GOP establishment just to keep Newt from getting the nomination?

  8. Anonymous
    January 22nd, 2012 @ 9:08 pm

    This is ridiculous. I can pick up the phone and call any number of people — including “evangelical leaders” — to whom I could attribute whatever blind quotes suit the narrative I’m trying to build. Somebody should try asking Ralph Z. Hallow if he wouldn’t apply a grain of salt to Erickson’s seemingly miraculous ability to find sources who affirm exactly what he wants his readers to believe.

    One may easily that Erickson isn’t quoting any sincere supporter of Rick Santorum for the very reason that any sincere supporter of Santorum would tell Erick Erickson to go straight to hell.

  9. Finrod Felagund
    January 22nd, 2012 @ 9:13 pm

    I’m mostly just the messenger on this one. Wrong thread.

  10. ThePaganTemple
    January 22nd, 2012 @ 9:28 pm

    He should bypass Florida and concentrate his resources in Michigan, where he would have the best chance. He can go after the social/Christian conservatives AND the rank-and-file union members who are hurting right now in Michigan. He can appeal to them, and if he would start THIS VERY SECOND he could get a head start and possibly beat Mitt in his own native  state. That would get his campaign the jump start it needs. He would get an infusion of capital and volunteers nationwide. I want to see him stay in for a while, and I’m telling you that’s the way for him to do it. Florida will be his swan song. He doesn’t have the resources to compete there adequately, and more to the point, he doesn’t have the same kind of natural constituency there that he has in Michigan.

  11. Finrod Felagund
    January 22nd, 2012 @ 9:37 pm

    I’m mostly just the messenger here.

  12. ThePaganTemple
    January 22nd, 2012 @ 9:38 pm

    I don’t know about that, he still carries some weight, especially since he’s a CNN analyst now.  Politics is a profession where compromise of principals is seen as a necessity, and even a virtue.

  13. ThePaganTemple
    January 22nd, 2012 @ 9:39 pm

    I don’t know about that, he still carries some weight, especially since
    he’s a CNN analyst now.  Politics is a profession where compromise of
    principals is seen as a necessity, and even a virtue.

  14. Memo From the National Affairs Desk: Somewhere, There Is an Island … : The Other McCain
    January 22nd, 2012 @ 9:43 pm

    […] 22: What Does This Sentence Mean?Jan. 21: SOUTH CAROLINA PRIMARY RESULTS: Newt Gingrich Stops Mitt Romney’s ‘Inevitability’; […]

  15. richard mcenroe
    January 22nd, 2012 @ 10:49 pm

    2010?  When Newt helped give a seat to a Democrat?

  16. richard mcenroe
    January 22nd, 2012 @ 10:51 pm

    Reagan. Eisenhower. Coolidge. Grant.

  17. richard mcenroe
    January 22nd, 2012 @ 10:55 pm

    Except the work on the Congressional scandals was actually done by a guy named Santorum, and a guy named Boehner, and five other House Republicans, before Newt jumped in front of the parade…

  18. Sven
    January 22nd, 2012 @ 11:05 pm

    If SC voters were using religious purity as a criterion, Gingrich would not have won and Santorum would have done better.

    By the way, how come no one ever said being Mormon was a problem for Huntsman? Or Harry Reid, for that matter? The Senate has been controlled by a Mormon for the last half-decade, for crying out loud, but people have a problem with Romney being  a member of the same church?

  19. ThePaganTemple
    January 23rd, 2012 @ 7:04 am

    Most independents don’t even remember Hurricane Katrina in 2005, let alone Newt Gingrich in 1995. If you brought his name up now and asked them if they liked him they’d rack their brains trying to figure out which American Idol contestant you were talking about.

  20. Bob Belvedere
    January 23rd, 2012 @ 7:47 am

    I like many of the commentators over there, especially Moe Lane, but they’re continued association with Erickson helps the bastard retain his influence.  Their reputations are all that is holding him up, that and the fact that the MSM loves a conservative who spits on his own.

    What I’m arguing for is ‘helping’ good people like Moe Lane see the light and leave Erickson alone in the Red State pod.

  21. Bob Belvedere
    January 23rd, 2012 @ 7:49 am

    While not agreeing with Pagan’s reasons in this one, his general point about Florida being real tough for RS is correct.  200,000+ people have already voted down there via the [now totally insane] absentee ballot process.

  22. Bob Belvedere
    January 23rd, 2012 @ 7:53 am

    I like many of the commentators over there, especially Moe Lane, but they’re continued association with Erickson
    helps the bastard retain his influence.  Their reputations are all that
    is holding him up, that and the fact that the MSM loves a conservative
    who spits on his own.

    What I’m arguing for is ‘helping’ good people like Moe Lane see the light and leave Erickson alone in the Red State pod.

    Go off and start your own version of Red State [it’s a good model in terms of structure] and wash away the taint of being associated with Little Napoleon [Complex].  This is all I’m arguing.

    I was too harsh in my wordings – apologies – and not clear in my intentions.

  23. Bob Belvedere
    January 23rd, 2012 @ 8:05 am

    Pagan: All three of those people helped bring down The Roman Republic.

  24. ThePaganTemple
    January 23rd, 2012 @ 9:00 am

    The problem with that is, how many people would read Moe Lane’s site if they weren’t brought over there from Red State. I’ve read his site, and its a damn good one, but unfortunately its not one of the first places you think of going to.

  25. ThePaganTemple
    January 23rd, 2012 @ 9:05 am

    If he started now in Michigan and concentrated there, he could possibly hand Mitt a humiliating defeat. If he starts at the regular schedule there, Mitt will win his home state handily. As for Florida, even if he does as good as he can hope to do, say twenty percent, how many delegates will that net him? And that’s even assuming he would do that good there, which frankly is quite unlikely.

    Plus, someone said last night Fl is winner-take-all. I think that’s wrong, but if she’s right that’s even worse. Santorum doesn’t have the same natural consistency there as he does in Michigan. Possibly the Cuban community, and you know Mitt has already been pouring all kinds of money and resources into that community for quite some time now, and all the other demographics as well.