steve benen: The right's approach to the political discourse, too often, hasn't progressed at all since 2002.

and their election returns are even worse..

ouch..

If you support torture, you're pro-America; if you support the rule of law, you're anti-America. If you believe war crimes should be ignored, you're pro-America; if you believe in accountability, you're anti-America.

The republican mantra :
WAR IS PEACE! FREEDOM IS SLAVERY! LOVE IS HATE
somewhere Gorge Orwell is smiling - it has come to pass

THAT "that this clown continues to help speak for the Republican Party in the 21st century is further evidence" that Obama will waltz to a second term.

TEXAS

The Republican Party is neither Republican nor an especially fun party! Discuss!

-Z

I don't think it's a leadership problem. Newt is undoubtedly following the views of the Republican base, not leading it. The problem is that the Republican party has jumped off a cliff.

SomeONE pull-ease tell me why the assertion that torturing our POWs MAKES ANOTHER ATTACK MORE LIKELY is not being talkied about by every Democrat from here to Zimbabwe. They know what a sick group of US personnel have authorized and are doing/have done to their neighbors, friends, and family members; that we have violated moral and ethical standards of treatment to other human beings on the mere suspicion or accusation of being involved in "terrorism"; that we are brutally and extensively abusing their brethren against agreed upon codes of human conduct. We are creating more extremists with this behavior, not less. This lowers the US to the level of barbarians and creates/extends hatred for us. A golden recruitment tool, "Look what the US is doing to your family, to the children of Allah!". C'mon politicians, get out the message, and get real.

MattF is dead-on target -- Gingrich's mouth is a direct function of the audience who's influence and favor he is attempting to gain.

That's Newt, reaching for the low hanging fruit. Its easy. Attack the messenger. Attach the label. The American right's way. Only works when they have a steady, non breathing, punching bag. Newt is so winded. He'll never catch a second breath.

Funny how this seems less than credible coming from the guy who led the impeachment hearings of President Clinton over an affair, while he was cheating on his second wife with his third.

Republicans have no sense of irony but a heightened sense of projection. If they accuse Dems of doing something it's because that's what they would be doing.

Why this clown continues to help speak for the Republican Party in the 21st century is further evidence of a party with a very serious leadership problem.

Don't ask why, just hope he keeps talking. Although as one of those anti-American leftists (who's also a Vietnam veteran and who's one leg lighter as a result) I'd like to slap the living @#%* out if his draft-dodging chickenhawk self.

I'm wondering if any of our allies, who would normally be expected to help us identify people who need to be questioned, will not do so as readily if they believe that we have not firmly established a zero torture tolerance policy. What the "conservatives" always seem to forget is that we need our allies' help, and if we're giving our allies (and the rule of law) the finger all the time, they will not be handing anyone over to us when we need them to.

Pissing on the rulebook doesn't make us safer. The pro-torture morons who live in their own reality need to be slapped down hard by the reality-based grownups.

Those of us who take the rule of law seriously aren't just wrong, the disgraced former Speaker argues, we literally don't love our country as much as he does.

When you call someone anti-American you generally mean that they hate America, not love it less than you do.

This kind of rhetoric that declares that you're un-American or anti-American if you disagree with Republican national security policies was absurd enough when there was a Republican administration in the White House. Now it's just plain insulting and desperate. Watching the Republican Party these days is kinda like watching somebody try to tread water upside down.

MattF said above: "I don't think it's a leadership problem. Newt is undoubtedly following the views of the Republican base, not leading it. The problem is that the Republican party has jumped off a cliff."

Remember when your mom used to ask you, "If all your friends jumped off a cliff, would you do it too?"

The GOP is the party for everyone who answered "Yes!!!" to that question.

Watching the Republican Party these days is kinda like watching somebody try to tread water upside down.

They're waterboarding themselves, aren't they?

dcrolg and MattF are correct.

Newt is a has-been who sees an ignorant, leaderless party as his only opportunity to get back on the merry-go-round and try for the brass ring again. He's telling the rabid base what they want to hear in hopes of assuming control.

I hope he keeps right on with what he's doing. He's a discredited windbag whose only contribution to political discourse is poison. If he becomes the republican leader, the Party of No will see the day it becomes the Party of No More on his watch.

Calling your political opponents anti-American only works if you have some credibility. When you go all Orwellian with your definitions, all but the most blindly partisan will catch on that you are an immoral, lying fool.

Keep it up, Newt. No Democrat can do as much to destroy the Republican Party as Republican leadership is doing. Maybe the prediction that the Blue Dogs will become the new opposition party when the Republicans collapse will be fulfilled well before we expect.

Limbaugh, Gingrich, Rove...the GOP's main "spokesmen" these days are people who don't have to worry about winning elections.

Works for me.

Clicked to add my 2 cents, but a bunch very with-it comments have left me with nothing new to add.

I find it amusing that Steve is perplexed with why the Conservative's haven't progressed. By definition, progression/evolution in thought is an oxymoran with American Conservatives. To stay the same is a conservative bono fides. 2002? They haven't changed since 1858.

"it probably never occurred to Gingrich to consider how ridiculous these kinds of attacks are."

"Republicans have no sense of irony but a heightened sense of projection."

These remarks made me think of an article in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy on the schools of thought on the very controversial subject of self-deception. As one would expect, the article is very professional and thought provoking.

My take on the thugs 'delusions', after reading the piece, is that even if they don't know they are lying and irrational, they should. If you only listen to Fox news, it is your fault if you are deluded.

As a fellow Vietnam vet, I would like to second Roger the Cabin Boy's sentiments. I would love to slap the shit out of Newt Gingrich and his attitudes that endanger our military forces.

That the torture position of Newt and these chickenhawk turds are endangering all current and future military personnel does not seem to be of importance to them. To veterans who do not want current and future enemies to use amerikan logic to justify torture of our military, it is of great importance.

fine--then I'm anti-american. I think justice is more important than icon-worshipping.

Those of us who take the rule of law seriously

And this is why we're still debating torture. This is a law and order issue, and those who oppose investigations should be hammered over and over in the next campaign for letting criminals subvert our system of justice. Bush, Cheney and the rest of the gang committed far more serious crimes than all of the illegal immigrants conservatives want to burn just for being in this country.

What's that quote? "The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting it to come out different." It seems like just yesterday that the pitbull in lipstick tried to use the "anti-American" smear to advance the republican party and it failed. It turns out that a majority of Americans are turned off by this type of devisive rhetoric. A commentator above is probably right that this is all just newt playing to the base, but i think the election showed that republicans need to look beyond the base. I just don't see how newt is helping their cause.

I also think that the republicans already have a major hypocrisy problem and for them to now argue against enforcing the law after promoting themselves as the law and order party makes it hard to take them seriously.

Okay, fine. Back atcha Newt.

Anyone who thinks we should let every president skate for every offense more grave than perjury is unAmerican.

I've had the civility not to say it out loud. I'm not interested in starting a fight, but protection of the Constitution is worth it and the weenie liberals that don't like to fight might surprise you if we see even a spark of willingness from the people who supposedly are "our people".

No one has standing to speak for an entity that no longer exists.

The GOP is dead; watch FNS in its stead.

I think it particularly irks military veterans like me who hate to be lectured on patriotism by a goddamn draft dodger.

What about the Anti-America right? like Stormfront and all those tea-bagging seccesion loving Miltia-ists priming their loads?

Why this clown continues to help speak for the Republican Party in the 21st century is further evidence of a party with a very serious leadership problem.

We could also ask why the news media continue to give this buffoon airtime.

This from the party that wants the President, therefore the country to fail and from the people who would like to secede from the Union.

O if only there were a way that we could facilitate their secession. They deserve a country of their own.

No way I'd allow any of these rightwing assholes to "secede". They don't get to take any part of this country or its resources or assets.

No, I say send them all to Waziristan, where they can spend some time with their ideological cousins. They'd probably learn that they have a lot more in common with the Taliban then they ever realized.

It beats me why Eliot Spitzer, embarrassed by his folly and working hard to save his marriage, is radioactive, but Newt Gingrich is a media darling. Can anyone tell me why serial adulterers who callously dump their wives to marry mistresses have any trust from the public. Who can explain it? Rush? George Will? John McCain?

Secession = American
Investigating Crimes = Anti American...

What don't you get Steve?

Name one person that is "anti-American left" Newt?? Just one. Throwing accusations around without any basis in truth is "slime-dogging". No wonder even your own party got rid of you. Anything he disagrees with is suddently anti-American Left, or hard leftist. By his definition all patriotic law abiding citizens were anti-American Leftist. The constitution, the bill of rights all anti-American leftist policies. What America does Newt live in...oh, the "real America" which consists of a few small communities in the South and excludes all American cities and most of the nation. The fool tries so desperately not to be irrelevant but I guess that requires rejection of all 100% of Americans instead of just 90%. This is what Newt does for the republican party:

"Following the Republican Party of late has been a movingly depressing experience, sort of like watching Old Yeller die — if Old Yeller were a worm-infested feral bitch who spent the past eight years biting children at bus stops and shitting in neighborhood swimming pools."
-- Matt Tiabbi of "Rolling Stone"

I honestly get the strong feeling that 70 years ago, Mr. Gingrich would have been one of the guiding stars in the German-American Bund. He talks a lot about being American, but he demonstrates very few actual American traditional values. His bent is more towards an authoritarian style than democratic. I suspect he shares Bush's wet dream that the US should be a dictatorship as long as he is the dictator.