{"id":1148,"date":"2010-05-18T19:48:00","date_gmt":"2010-05-18T19:48:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/highplainsblogger.wordpress.com\/2010\/05\/18\/gingrich-out-on-a-limb"},"modified":"2010-05-18T19:48:00","modified_gmt":"2010-05-18T19:48:00","slug":"gingrich-out-on-a-limb","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/?p=1148","title":{"rendered":"Gingrich … out on a limb"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
Tweet<\/a><\/div>\n

\"\"<\/a>Former U.S. House Speaker Newt Gingrich is a smart guy. Don’t take my word for it. He’ll all but so say so himself.<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

But the one-time Georgia Republican firebrand-turned-speaker isn’t a fortune teller. He has told Politico.com that President Obama has a 20 percent chance of being re-elected in 2012. And, by golly, he might run for the GOP nomination against the president. Gingrich also suggests he could be the one to send Obama packing.<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n
Hmmm. I will respond with two words: Ronald Reagan.<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n
President Reagan was standing guard over an economy in 1982 that was in horrible condition. His poll numbers were in the tank. Joblessness rivaled today’s numbers; inflation was out of control. The mid-term elections that year ended up costing the Republicans many seats in the House and the Senate — a circumstance facing Democrats in the upcoming mid-terms this year.<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n
Oh, what to do? Democrats licked their chops at their prospects in 1984 of retaking the White House. They nominated former Vice President Walter Mondale at their convention that year.<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n
What happened next ought to serve as a cautionary tale for Gingrich and all the know-it-alls today.<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n
Reagan not only won re-election in ’84, he came within about 4,000 votes of scoring a 50-state sweep over Mondale, who barely carried his home state of Minnesota.<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n
It was “morning in America.”<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n
Now … will history repeat itself in precisely that fashion in 2012? I’m not smart enough — unlike Newtie Gingrich — to make such a prediction. I will say, however, that it’s foolish to suggest today — more than two years from the next presidential election — how it will all turn out.<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n
President Mondale surely would agree.<\/div>\n\n
Tweet<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Former U.S. House Speaker Newt Gingrich is a smart guy. Don’t take my word for it. He’ll all but so say so himself. But the one-time Georgia Republican firebrand-turned-speaker isn’t a fortune teller. He has told Politico.com that President Obama has a 20 percent chance of being re-elected in 2012. And, by golly, he might … Continue reading Gingrich … out on a limb<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1148","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1148","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1148"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1148\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1148"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1148"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1148"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}