On The Perils of Running

Too many scams at once.

While Newt Gingrich was busy pissing away his backer's money paying off whatever unholy deal he struck with Wife Number Three to play "candidate" on his Tiffany hegira/jubilee/"campaign" for "President" in such battleground locations as Maui and the sun-drenched deck of a Mediterranean cruise ship his other Ponzi schemes were running out of steam.

Newt Gingrich’s former group, American Solutions, shutters its doors

By Karen Tumulty, Published: August 26

The vast advocacy and fundraising operation that former House speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) built after leaving Capitol Hill more than a decade ago has ceased to exist — a casualty of Gingrich’s decision to run for president in 2012.

According to an Aug. 1 filing with the Internal Revenue Service, American Solutions for Winning the Future raised more than $2.4 million during the first six months of the year, but it spent almost $3 million.

“It closed down” in July, said longtime Gingrich adviser Joe Gaylord, who had taken over the organization after Gingrich’s departure. “There’s nothing to say. We had difficulty raising money after Newt left. .?.?. We didn’t want to run the organization into deep, deep, deep debt. So we closed it down.”
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In its heyday, the group raised more money than any other such organization, collecting more than $52 million in its first four years. Nearly two-thirds of that, however, went toward fundraising, which made it an unusually expensive operation.

The group’s donor base included more than 300,000 contributors who gave $200 or less, although it also had a number of wealthy benefactors, including casino mogul Sheldon Adelson, who provided $6 million.
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American Solutions for Winning the Future: Best. Sucker. List. Ever.

Seriously, if it's 2011 and you're actually writing checks to Newton Leroy Gingrich and Lady Macbeth, I definitely want your mailing address. It will make my upcoming Fundraiser at the End of the Universe ever so much easier.

Then again, maybe Newt will fool us all!

The Gingrich Surge!

By David Weigel | Posted Monday, Aug. 29, 2011, at 2:09 PM EDT

What's the best part of this Paul Bedard item? Is it the title, "Newt Gingrich Could Be the New 'Comeback Kid'?'" The conditional tense is a magical thing -- I could write a headline like "Worldwide Pandemic Could Make Buddy Roemer the GOP Nominee, If He Happens to Be the Only Candidate With An Immunity," and it would be exactly as accurate as Bedard's hed. Is it the fact that the evidence for the Gingrich surge is a quote from a "GOP analyst"? What does that even mean? Does this source write psychological profiles of Republicans? I checked with a random GOP source of my own, just to see if I could get an anonymous quote about this article.

It's far fetched bordering on comical. Operationally, how does the guy raise the money to run a campaign?
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My conclusion: Buy Newt on InTrade. But only do so if you convince yourself that when a man known to almost all GOP primary voters is polling in single digits, it's because he's about to stage a surge.

Rightwing Talking Point Pez Dispenser and member of the Best Damned Political something
something on Cable Teevee -- Erick, Son of Erick -- sits wingnut shiva sheds a sticky little tear for his hero (emphasis added):

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For many of us who got our start in politics around the Republican Revolution of 1994, it is kind of sad to see Newt Gingrich neither victorious nor really beaten nor vanquished — then it would at least have been a momentous fight. That would have had some catharsis to it.

He’s just out of gas. He fizzled without so much as a flash in the pan. How does that happen to a guy who once was the most powerful Republican in America?

Inasmuch as Conservative death-eaters like Mr. Erickson spend much of their lives frantically fending off with a pointed stick even the mildest forms of introspection, I suspect he really, really doesn't want the answer to that question.