a REALLY great Christmas cards - well at least for those of us with a twisted sense of humor

two of the nastiest men in the Republican Party are saying nice things about Newt Gingrich

from salon.com

http://www.salon.com/2011/12/14/two_nasty_republicans_say_nice_things_about_newt/?source=newsletter

First Dick Cheney, then Rudy Giuliani suggests Gingrich may be the toughest candidate in the GOP field

By Joan Walsh

With a straight face, Giuliani explained why charges of “elitism” wouldn’t fly against Gingrich. “One of the strengths he has is he’s got a common touch, he’s able to talk to people, he comes from a poor family, understands poverty from that point of view. He doesn’t come from the American elite. It’s going to be hard to paint him that way. There are a lot of other ways you can paint him, but you can’t paint him that way.”

You can’t? The man with the half-million-dollar Tiffany credit line? The guy who wants to do away with “truly stupid” child labor laws? The one who thinks the poor lack a work ethic? The “historian” who earned just under $2 million from Fannie Mac and took in another $37 million for his healthcare think-tank? The candidate whose tax plan overwhelmingly favors the super-rich? How many ways is Giuliani wrong there? More ways than he and Gingrich have wives between them.

Can we also acknowledge there is no such thing as a “Reagan Democrat” anymore? There are white working-class people who now permanently vote against their own class interests, and they’re Republicans, not Democrats. Then there are white working-class people who are understandably sometimes confused about which party represents them, because Democrats have spent so many years sucking up to Wall Street and playing down their populist past. Some of those voters — the ones who are public workers, or union members, or close to retirement and listening to proposals to raise the eligibility age for Social Security and Medicare — are starting to realize that they have become the GOP’s latest scapegoat, the 21st century welfare queens, and they’re taking another look at Democrats. Some white working-class voters stayed Democrats. But the Reagan Democrat analysis hasn’t made sense for a long time.

Finally, I love the fact that Gingrich and Giuliani have six wives and two marriage annulments between them. Add in Donald Trump, who seems to be leaning toward Gingrich too, they can start a Three Wives Club. Way to go, family values party!

http://www.salon.com/2011/12/14/two_nasty_republicans_say_nice_things_about_newt/?source=newsletter

The GOP’s new, post-Clinton-phobic world By Steve Kornacki of salon.com

Newt Gingrich seems to look at the 1990s a lot differently now than he did at the time -- just like his party

It wasn’t long ago that the mere hint of an association with Bill Clinton was the kiss of death in Republican politics. Maybe you remember the run-up to the pivotal South Carolina primary in 2000, when John McCain, stung by a barrage of negative attacks from his opponent’s campaign, declared in an ad that George W. Bush “twists the truth like Clinton.” So stinging was that charge that Bush brought it up at the start of their next debate, accusing McCain of the lowest form of politics.

“You can disagree on issues,” Bush said. “We’ll debate issues. But whatever you do, don’t equate my integrity and trustworthiness to Bill Clinton.”

Contempt for all things Clinton was the animating force on the right for more than a decade, from the moment Bill was elected in 1992 until well after he left the White House, with the prospect of a Clinton restoration hovering over American politics for most of the aughts. But when Barack Obama unexpectedly beat out Hillary in 2008 and became the face of national Democratic politics, it gave the right a new all-purpose villain — and an incentive to embrace a revised, more Clinton-friendly version on the 1990s

.....

The reality of the 1990s is that the conservative movement that drives the modern Republican Party regarded Clinton with the same suspicion and animosity that it has regarded every Democratic president of the modern era. He was the enemy, he’d won office through less than honorable means, and he was to be fought every step of the way. Feeding and channeling this mindset was key to the rise of Gingrich, who served as the face of the congressional GOP’s assault on the Clinton White House. “Counterculture McGoverniks” is how he referred to the first couple back in those days, and he also led the charge in hyping the supposed Whitewater scandal.

Against that backdrop, it makes sense that McCain saw linking Bush to Clinton as a killer GOP primary strategy in 2000, just as it’s understandable why Bush took such strong exception to the charge. And if Hillary Clinton had somehow won in ’08, then rest assured the right would still be at war with the Clintons today, with Gingrich reminding GOP primary voters of all of the gallant fight he’d led against them. But Obama won, and his election instantly altered the right’s psychology.


link to full article:

http://www.salon.com/2011/12/14/two_nasty_republicans_say_nice_things_about_newt/?source=newsletter

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Gingrich: People like me are what stand between us and Auschwitz.”

from salon.com

Tuesday, Dec 13, 2011 10:00 PM 02:48:09 UTC+1000

Apocalypse Newt

Gingrich's bizarre obsession with civilization-ending threats


Credit: AP/Wikipedia)

Newt Gingrich has changed a lot of positions over his many years in public life, but there are a few things about his worldview that are consistent. One is an obsession with apocalyptic or civilization-ending threats, often paired with the idea that Gingrich himself is alone (or nearly so) in recognizing the scale of the danger and in being equipped to deal with it.

My favorite example of this genre of Gingrich studies is a 1994 interview in which he declared “People like me are what stand between us and Auschwitz.”

That line became an instant classic for Newt aficionados; less well-known is that Gingrich elaborated on the theme — at length — in the same interview, conducted by the Atlanta Journal Constitution:

“I see evil around me every day,” he says. He cites the widespread slaughter from Bosnia to Washington D.C. The German tourist killed by what Gingrich calls “a savage” from the urban jungle of Miami.

“We are at the edge of losing this civilization,” he says. “You get two more generations of what we had for the last 20 years and we’re in desperate trouble …

......

Gingrich also sees the supposed rise of Shariah in America as a threat to “Western civilization.”

“Stealth jihadis use political, cultural, societal, religious, intellectual tools; violent jihadis use violence,” he said in a speech at the American Enterprise Institute last year. “But in fact they’re both engaged in jihad and they’re both seeking to impose the same end state which is to replace Western civilization with a radical imposition of Sharia.”

read full article at salon.com

http://www.salon.com/2011/12/13/apocalypse_newt/?source=newsletter

anyone around here living in or have lived in Guam or the CNMI?

I've been on Saipan for six months now and Hawaii is the closest point heading to the U.S. mainland. A lot of the T.V. programming here is out of Hawaii - even my bank account is now with Bank of Hawaii. Lots of the locals and ethnic Filipinos who live in the CNMI have lived or gone to school or have family in Hawaii.

The scenery, climate and demographics I think are probably most similar to Hawaii of anywhere else with in U.S. sovereignty






Anyway, just curious if there is anyone around who has connections with these parts just east of you about 2000 miles.

Analysis: Newt Gingrich survives first big night of attacks - By Chris Moody | The Ticket

It does sound like it was a very good night for Newt and a very bad night for Mitt. And in that I do rejoice. Granted there is some risk in a Newt nomination. Even if it is all smoke and mirrors - he can handle himself in a debate in a manner that can bamboozle a lot of people - especially low information independent voters. Yes, Obama is smarter than Newt. But I would still be concerned about one advantage Newt would have in a one-on-one debate with the President. Newt is a sociopath. The President with whatever faults he may have -is not.

Still I do think the prospect of seeing the greatest Democratic landslide since 1964 is still very strong. The right-wing loves him because he so demonizes his opponents and is so fall of himself and so full of hate. I am confident enough that the public will see this and grant us an opportunity to crush the right in a manner that has not been seen in almost 50 years. That is why I whole heartedly support Newt Gingrich for the Republican nomination.


http://l2.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2/l7iK9RmoRdMGsEk0ZH.rbg--/YXBwaWQ9eW5ld3M7cT04NTt3PTYzMA--/
Romney and Gingrich (AP)


Even though most of the criticism was aimed at Gingrich, Romney will likely suffer the most from the contest. During a brief argument with Rick Perry, Romney challenged the Texas governor to a $10,000 bet that he never supported a national individual mandate to purchase health insurance in his book No Apology, as Perry accused. Expect to see that clip played repeatedly over the course of the campaign.

If Saturday's Republican presidential debate was the weathervane that would signal whether the Republican primary race would go negative in the days before the first caucuses and primaries, we're in for quite the slog.

Since Republican support for businessman Herman Cain began to slide--he dropped out of the race last weekend--Gingrich has replaced him as the the latest "anti-Mitt Romney" candidate. And based on the response from Romney's campaign this week, it is clear that Boston is taking Gingrich's rise seriously. Romney this week launched his very own blitzkrieg against Gingrich, deploying the many surrogates who have endorsed him to nail him at several angles. The campaign also released a bruising anti-Gingrich web video that reminded voters of the time he criticized the entitlement reform plan put forth by Republican Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan and passed by the House GOP, calling it "right-wing social engineering."

Gingrich on Friday struck back, accusing Romney of "running to the left of Teddy Kennedy" when he ran for Senate in 1994. In those comments, Gingrich suggested that Romney is a politician who is only a conservative when it's convenient, a criticism that has been ruthlessly lobbed at the former governor for years. Later that day, Gingrich's team in Iowa blasted Romney for launching the latest attacks on Gingrich, calling the effort "a load of crap."

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/ticket/analysis-newt-gingrich-survives-first-big-night-attacks-040437489.html

George McGovern released from hospital

Former Sen. George McGovern has been released from Avera McKennan Hospital and University Health Center, the hospital reported in a statement.

“Sen. McGovern’s condition continues to improve and we are pleased with his progress,” said Dr. Michael Elliott, the chief medical officer at Avera. “But it’s very important that he continue to rest quietly until he has completely healed.”
McGovern, 89, was airlifted to Avera on Dec. 2 after falling and hitting his head. He was on his way to the set of C-SPAN’s series “The Contenders,” a special show about his 1972 presidential campaign

http://www.argusleader.com/article/20111208/NEWS/312080010/George-McGovern-released-from-hospital