**WARNING: POLITICO SOURCE***: GOP Dusts Off Newt's Playbook

[wyldwolf]

Republicans are hatching a political comeback by dusting off a strategic playbook written nearly two decades ago.

Its themes: Unite against Democrats’ economic policy, block and counter health care reform and tar them with spending scandals.

Those represent the political trifecta that former House Speaker Newt Gingrich bet on in 1994 to produce a historic Republican takeover of Congress.

Now, some Republicans believe President Barack Obama’s one-two push on the economy and health care reform is setting the stage for a new round of significant gains, if not a total takeover.

It’s not 1994 anymore

For one thing, Obama isn’t Clinton.

President Bill Clinton never won a popular majority in his two elections. Obama did. His vote margin exceeded 9 million votes, the largest ever for a nonincumbent presidential contender — including Ronald Reagan’s 1980 win over President Jimmy Carter.

And another thing: Republicans aren’t in the ascendancy as they were in 1994. After two victorious election cycles, the Democrats have puréed the Republicans into their purest conservative caucus.

In a way, that made it easier for Republicans to vote against Obama’s stimulus plan. But a repeat performance on health care could be more complicated.

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0209/19158.html

[saltpoint]

1. With Newt, I get the ghostly political corruption of Warren Harding AND

the twisted, macabre, menace of an evil circus clown.

[MessiahRp]

2. The GOP is on crack...

How you could look at the last two rounds of ass whoopings, the lasting economic mess we're in that was of their doing and say, "You know what America wants? Some good ol' fashioned Republican policies. That's the ticket!"? These people are completely insane. Every last one of them.

Rp

[Jennicut]

13. Crack or meth or some kind of illegal substance

how else can anyone explain the stupidity of their "thinking"? Its not 1994 anymore. Everyone but the 30% of diehard Rethugs have smartened up after 8 years of Bush.

[babylonsister]

3. And don't forget Churchill!

http://theplumline.whorunsgov.com/house-republicans/eri... /

Eric Cantor’s Role Models: Newt Gingrich And Winston Churchill

Yesterday the news broke that GOP House minority whip Eric Cantor — who helped lead the GOP in unanimous opposition to the stimulus package — is modeling his approach to political combat with Dems on Newt Gingrich’s performance as House GOP leader in the 1990s.

Cantor is apparently taking advice directly from Gingrich, and the revelation prompted some critics to ask why Cantor is making an apparent role model out of someone with a spotty record of success and a history of extreme partisanship.

more...

[Captain Hilts]

6. Can seances with Churchill be next? I doubt Churchill would talk to him. nt

[AllentownJake]

12. Churchill was an imperialist pig

He'd pick up the phone.

[Captain Hilts]

17. Churchill was a man of his time. Cantor a man out of touch with his time and country.

BIG difference.

[TlalocW]

4. A lot of people, who are are sick of politics as usual

Know that the current attitude of republicans had its start in 1994 and its heyday under Newt. Let them dust off the playbook; the times and politics have changed.

TlalocW

[Captain Hilts]

5. And look where it got Newt. The Unemployment line. Bubba won that one in the long run. nt

[Still Sensible]

9. I agree Bill won that one, but it might have been a

different story if Newt hadn't overplayed his hand. He thought the 1994 "Contract With America" victory when they took over the Congress for the first time in about half a century was a mandate to do whatever the hell they wanted. When they shut down the government twice and people didn't get their checks, they were exposed as the ideologues they were. Bill rightly came off as the one really serving the people.

Unfortunately, Bush/Cheney and Company overplayed their hand even more, but because they were able to "Keep America Scared" after 9/11, they got away with it for more than five years and got (or stole) themselves a second term. The damage they were able to do in that time dwarfs everything Newt and his minions even envisioned 15 years ago.

[southern_dem]

7. Cantor and Bohner

are no Newt. Newt was an ass, but he was an intelligent ass.

[Jennicut]

15. True, he was smart strategically. They are nowhere near smart enough.

[opihimoimoi]

8. PUKE ON Newt...he served divorce papers on a sick wife just outta the operation

Whad an asshole...

He is a POS....are the PUBs that desperate for Power they gonna go with newt and his playbook? OMG...lemme get the popcorn

[uponit7771]

10. But what are they going to say? The last 3 republican president were Rinos? We'll stop spending this

...time around?!

The contract is also going to be stomped on by Obama adding the yearly appropriations for the wars and medicare D to the deficit, then he'll be able to say he cut spending like Clinton did.

The last 2 democrat presidents cut spending the last 3 republican presidents double our debt.

[Dawgs]

11. Never work, for 2 reasons.

1) It's a completely different time. The Republicans were fighting against a Democratic congress that had been in power for decades. This time people remember what it was like when the Republicans were in charge.

2) Obama will not let them control the message. Bill Clinton, and the Democratic congress of the early nineties, failed to come up with their own message. Obama understands this, and he is better at selling his message than anything the Republicans can put up.

[zulchzulu]

14. The GOP Batcave has been planning on 2010 since last spring

They knew they were going to lose in 2008 and the only strategy they have is to pin Bush's disasters on the Democrats by 2010 and try for the 1994 Redux.

It's not going to work.

[falcon97]

16. Crap. We're gonners now.

:sarcasm: