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Posted on 12/30/2011 7:36:21 PM PST by TBBT
DES MOINES — Alarmed by Newt Gingrich’s decline in the polls in the face of a fusillade of negative advertisements, some senior aides and grass-roots supporters have suggested that he reverse course and fight fire with fire, fearing for the future of his candidacy if he does not.
Mr. Gingrich’s vow to stay positive draws applause at every stop of his winding Iowa bus tour, but polls raise questions about that strategy as attack ads against him from his opponents’ campaigns and independent groups have seeped into voters’ minds.
New polls of Iowa Republicans this week suggest that Mr. Gingrich has lost more than half his support, as he has fallen from the top of the field to a statistical tie with candidates he once was far ahead of, like former Senator Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania and Gov. Rick Perry of Texas.
“How long can you take the beating before hitting back?” said Josh Byrnes, a state representative and the chairman of Mr. Gingrich’s campaign for Mitchell County, who added that he was “blown away” by how much damage the attack ads had done.
“Maybe someday you’ll look back and say, ‘Boy, he should have pulled the gloves off,’ ” Mr. Byrnes said.
Among the campaign’s senior staff, “there’s a small chorus of folks who have been urging him to respond in kind” to the blistering barrage on the airwaves, a top aide said.
Instead of the gauzy “Morning in America”-type ads that Mr. Gingrich prefers, some advisers discussed whether the campaign should run the kind of attack that the Democratic National Committee created last month aimed at Mitt Romney’s shifting stances, accusing him of being “two men trapped in one body.”
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
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Well said!!!
Well, Newt mentioned that Romney made money by bankrupting companies at Bain Capital and got bashed by the beltway media. He has called Romney a Massachusetts moderate. He pointed out in the one debate that Romney lost to Kennedy and therefore couldn’t become a career politician. He said he couldn’t vote for Ron Paul.
So he’s done some criticizing of the other candidates. I guess this is about him not doing it in actual produced TV ads? One problem is most of the criticism of Romney would be centered around Bain Capital, therefore it might not play well to all of the Republican base, e.g. tugging the heartstrings with interviews with laid-off workers. I’m also not sure how a negative ad calling someone a heartless tycoon or whatever counters an ad where they call you a socialist or whatever. It’s not a defense so both candidates come out dirty.
I mostly wouldn’t do negative ads, I would do contrast ads. I would put Newt’s experience, achievements and ideas up on the screen and compare it to Romney’s weaker offerings. I do think they need to do flip-flop ads like are on YouTube. Unfortunately the Wall Street tycoon ads that will really kill Romney just can’t play in the Republican primary without backfiring. So people will remain ignorant of how vulnerable he is.
FYI, JimRob has some thoughts on Gingrich in his post #13 on this thread:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2825718/posts
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It’s because she’s charmed the electorate about as much as she charmed all those guys in high school who didn’t ask her to the prom.
I would love to see Newt set fire to Romney’s fancy pants during a debate. Just rip him a new one. I don’t recall seeing anyone do that yet.
Amazing...
If he handles it properly, not only will he not need to go to the same negative levels as his opponents, but he can essentially make it backfire on them.
Don’t get me wrong,if Newt is the nominee-I will vote for him.It’s a shame but I can’t respect his weak moral character.
“Not to him and Nancy all comfy on the couch. You didn’t make a rebuttal. You made a generic statement and called me invincible and ignorant. That’s not a rebuttal. That’s an insult.”
I did not call you invincible. I recognized that willfully ignoring facts results in invincible ignorance. Also, if a thing is true it is no insult.
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