How Newt Gingrich blew it: An Iowa road map

politico.com ^ | 1/2/12 8:22 PM EST | JONATHAN MARTIN

[VU4G10]

MARSHALLTOWN, Iowa – The high water mark of Newt Gingrich’s presidential campaign may have been November 27th, the day the New Hampshire Union Leader endorsed his candidacy for president.

The famously conservative paper’s endorsement was a priceless gift. The former House Speaker proceeded to squander it.

In doing so, Gingrich revealed that he learned all the wrong lessons from his campaign’s collapse this summer and none of the right ones from his remarkable comeback.

Instead of seizing the moment and making an aggressive case for why the contest was now a two-man race between a movement conservative and flip-flopping moderate — a unique opportunity afforded by the endorsement’s implicit-but-unmistakable critique of Mitt Romney in his firewall state — Gingrich fell back to his familiar habits, a routine marked by too much self-assurance and not enough discipline.

[HereInTheHeartland]

There are hundreds of media people here in Iowa right now. They all want to cover or create their own angle to write about.

[Artcore]

“Politico” was all I had to see. Didn’t even need to read the article. Ah, let me guess; Romney is the only viable candidate?

Poltico is such a rag!

[skeeter]

Wrong. Gingrich is 4th because he was targeted by the Romney smear machine. He needs to reciprocate by kicking Romney in the shnards and keep kicking until folks start getting the message Romney is just another establishment stooge.

[show]

Politico is a Rag that promotes Leftist Propaganda

Only Hacks work for politico. These type of leftest quoting threads need more barf alerts...

[Goldie Lurks]

Written by Jonathan Martin...No need to read any further.

[Presbyterian Reporter]

I am waiting for that day when Politico can no longer be posted/linked to Free Republic. In the same manner as Huffington Post.

[Old Sarge]

Politico-Obama? Seriously?

[Track9]

Jonathan ‘Chiwawa’ Martin..

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks VU4G10.

[CMailBag]

POLITIKKKO

[VanDeKoik]

Yes.

Romney, Paul, and Bachmann all worked together there.

That wont happen again.

[cardinal4]

There appears to be a cottage industry shaping up amongst the journolists; advising conservatives of their choices.
Guess what, Martin, we don’t give a Shiite what your opinion..

[RecoveringPaulisto]

Wait, the Romney smear machine forced Gingrich to do this:

Romney is more powerful than I thought!

[Zhang Fei]

“This has been a great example of best of Newt and worst of Newt,” said Dan Meyer, his Chief of Staff as speaker, of Gingrich’s December. “He has the vision thing and he knows how to inspire people. But he was going to be smarter than the consultants and he didn’t pay enough attention to fundraising and organization and so when he got pounded he couldn’t respond.”

Gingrich’s problems weren’t just on the airwaves here, though.

Until an Indiana-based GOP direct mail consultant, Chris Faulkner, arrived in Iowa a week ago at the behest of a political director Gingrich only hired a week before that, the candidate had nobody here running his day-to-day caucus effort.

Beyond the TV barrage and tactical missteps, though, he lost his lead for a more fundamental reason: just as Gingrich demonstrated during his speakership, the most basic ability to stay disciplined and drive a consistent message escaped him.

Back in the day, the press used to hammer Reagan for being too on-message (i.e. using press questions as opportunities to reinforce his talking points rather than actually answering the questions). Whatever the negatives of being on-message, Reagan did win two presidential terms.

[Zhang Fei]

Appearing at a POLITICO forum in Des Moines on November 16th, he was asked if he had the cash for TV ads. “We’ll be able to afford them; I don’t know that we’ll do them,” said Gingrich. “We may do all of our stuff in social media. It will depend on what we think works best, particularly here where you’re targeting a very definable universe.” It was Newt-the-futurist, musing about an unconventional approach to politicking that would break all the rules.

This is an excellent article. Thanks. A lot of gems in here...

[okie01]

Romney is more powerful than I thought!

There's this to be said, though: Gingrich has since admitted the Pelosi sitting was a "mistake" and that he no longer believes in AGW.

Romney, on the other hand, still professes to believe in man-caused Global Warming.

[Jane Long]

Politico is a Rag that promotes Leftist Propaganda
Only Hacks work for politico. These type of leftest quoting threads need more barf alerts...

Spot on!

[RecoveringPaulisto]

Of course he thinks it’s a mistake now! It’s politically expedient.

[FrdmLvr]

I always thought it would be funny if Jim Robinson put a “barf alert” option in the posting format.