Newt Gingrich performs political sepaku

A few years back, I was one of the Bloggers for Huckabee, actually one of the first bloggers he had on the rolls. And as the campaign primaries unfolded, so did Huck. Or more accurately, he imploded. A series of unexplainable gaffes and ham handed political mistakes cost him the primary and I believe the presidency. Because I believe he would have defeated Obama in the general election.

It was painful to watch him unravel thusly. I believe due to the rigors of the campaign, something he had not really prepared himself for.

I'm getting a deja vu thing here with Newt.

His disastrous performance on Sunday's Meet the Press, probably ended his campaign before it ever got off the ground.

Bashing Paul Ryan's budget, talking about right wing social engineering, contradicting himself -- he displayed a tone deafness to the grass roots political uprising in his own party that defies explanation.

Of course, he's desperately trying to walk this stuff back. Talking about how the MtP thing was out of context, how he wasn't aggressive enough, too scholarly, yada, yada . . .

I'm going to give him the same benefit he gave Sarah Palin after her ambush interview by the now unemployed Katie Couric -- how can Newt hope to run the country when he can't handle a simple interview?

I'll give him credit for taking his lumps and trying to fix all this. And he actually seems to relish the idea of fighting to restore his campaign. But I believe he's done for here.

I wouldn't have voted for him unless he was the Republican nominee anyway. My personal feeling is that Newt's a lot like Bill Clinton -- Clinton only wanted to be President so he could spend the rest of his life being referred to as "Former President Clinton" it was a resume thing, not a "vision thing" as Bush used to say.

Plus, they have better looking interns in Washington as opposed to Arkansas. And you know how ole Billy Jeff likes him some interns.

Newt just wants to show a list of "things" he got done. He doesn't care if they fit in with his political party's ideals, he just wants a list of accomplishments after his name. That's why someone who is supposedly so smart has jumped fully onto the farsical AGW bandwagon and refuses to notice the scores of scientists now pointing out all the faulty science and misinformation in Al Gore's ponzi scheme.

So sadly, Newt's going to keep making the rounds of the talk shows, walking back his talk and diluting the field for the next election. All to feed his ego.

It's going to be a long drawn out political death, and one that will probably be enjoyed as much on the right as the left.