Newt Gingrich, quoted today by Roger Simon, on the current state of the Republican Party:
“The Republican Party right now is like a midsize college team trying to play in the Superbowl,” Gingrich told me Wednesday. “It is pretty hard to say our losses were because of John McCain’s campaign. McCain performed way above plausibility compared to where the Republican president was in the polls. We have to look honestly at what went wrong.”
But nah--while I have great respect for Speaker Gingrich, I think he goes way too far. Read today what R. Emmett Tyrrell, of the American Spectator--who attended the big conservative summit held two days after the election--has to say today about conservatism's prospects:
"What provoked [David] Brooks's fandango with the Traditionalists and the Reformers [he's referring to a column Brooks wrote in the New York Times, which argued that such a split now exists within the GOP] was a meeting the former group held in the Virginia hills outside Washington to prepare for the years ahead. As Brooks reports, I was present; his term Traditionalist, however, is misleading. There was more variety within the group than you would find among liberals planning a revival in 2004. There were libertarians, evangelicals, tax cutters, hawkish foreign policy advocates, and others. It was indeed the kind of turnout that could be termed "Reaganite," and there are other meetings coming up. For years the conservative movement has had more variety than the liberal movement, which might explain why only 22% of the American people call themselves liberal while 34% call themselves conservatives. There is vitality on the right, and there will be vitality in the wilderness, though the last time we were out here we only stayed two years. Liberal overreach and incompetence saw to that."
I think Tyrrell is closer to the mark. On the other hand, perhaps Newt simply wants Republicans to understand that the situation we face IS serious, that we have a big job on our hands, that the Democrats, Obama, and the left present a big obstacle, and that a comeback won't be easy. We must not be complacent. If that was his purpose, then I don't blame him for pushing us in that direction.
