So who's the most dangerous GOP presidential candidate?

[Cyrano]

Newt Gingrich.

Most of the others are outright idiots with the exception of Romney who only sold his soul.

Gingrich, on the other hand, never had to sell his soul since every time he opens his mouth, he makes it apparent that he never had one. He does, however, seem intelligent to many of those who lack the capacity to think.

The truth is that Newt is peddling demented, rancid bullshit by using a large vocabulary and a smattering of historic knowledge. But in Newt's case, his intentional distortions of both language and history make him the equivalent of a child's monster under the bed.

Put simply, Newt is much more than a prick. He's dangerous. Imagine if he were to get the GOP nomination. Given the way our country is divided, who's to say he couldn't beat Obama in the general election. Especially with the Republican's ability to steal elections.

So take just a few seconds and try to imagine Newt Gingrich in the Oval Office. My own opinion is that he'd make Caligula seem like a saint.

[Mojambo]

1. I agree. Gingrich by far

He's also got the most skeletons in his closet, by far.

Obama would have less trouble beating him than Romney.

[Cyrano]

5. Republicans don't care about skeletons in the closet.

They care about ideological purity and just plain cruelty towards the "other."

Newt fits that bill. Especially when it comes to the cruelty part.

[Thinkingabout]

16. Republican are always saints but

Newt makes it doubtful. Newt started the US on a downward spiral and he hoist have limits. He lead the investigation costing $100m into anything he could drum up on the Clintons while lining up #3, he is evil.

[Meeker Morgan]

2. The most dangerous is whichever one could actually get elected.

Either Romney or possibly someone who isn't in the race yet.

[reACTIONary]

10. +1

[Angry Dragon]

3. newt has too much baggage

3 wives, ethic violations, old,

[Cyrano]

8. Given today's GOP, there's no such thing as "too much baggage" as long

as you line up with their basic tests of true swinishness.

[Mojambo]

17. Yeah, but it will play if he gets to the general.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

4. Gingrich is a nasty piece of work, no question.

But his dickishness will be his undoing, I think. Although GOPers like their candidates to be "tough," Newt's attitude - that he's both smarter and more dickish than anybody else - won't sell well with those multitudes who want their president to be a guy they'd like to have a beer with. Nobody wants to have a beer with Newt; they'd get a lecture about drinking inferior beer and another lecture about how much more he knows about everything than anybody else does. Pounding brewskis with Newt Gingrich would be an intensely unpleasant experience.

And then there's the fact that he's a serial adulterer. While GOPers and 'baggers tend to forgive the sins of their candidates -- even the same sins for which they condemn Democrats -- Newt's personal life is pretty lurid by anybody's standards.

He's a nasty man.

I also think Obama could whup his pasty fat ass in a debate.

[tabatha]

6. Which one is not?

[Cyrano]

7. Yep, I get your point. But there's worse, really worse and worstest.

With the exception of Dick Cheney, Karl Rove and a few others, it's really hard to think of anyone who dwells in a deeper sewer than Gingrich.

[Liberal_in_LA]

9. agreed n/t

[jberryhill]

11. Dangerous as in "to self or others"?

I'd refer the lot of them to 72 hour observation.

[Cyrano]

13. Yep, I think you've hit it, jberryhill.

If any of these GOP candidates were put under 72 hour observation, chances are they would remain in a padded room for the foreseeable future.

[dimbear]

12. Amazing natural history fact: Newts are not reptiles.

Resemblances are deceiving sometimes.

[Cyrano]

15. I really don't think that Newt is a reptile, dimbear.

I think he's among the most dispicable human beings in the history of American politics. And this gives him a seat in a gallery of really horrible people.

[dimbear]

19. Agree 100% with that.

At any rate, Newt is not to be worried over.

He can't get the nod because he isn't the richest guy on the stage.

[MADem]

14. Huntsman. He has the ability to appear "normal" and he has less baggage.

He's that Tabula Rasa everyone seeks. When you don't know shit about someone, you can write your hopes and dreams on the image that you imagine they project.

If Newt surges, we'll get to revisit his three marriages (to his high school teacher, to clever Marianne, who forced Calista to stipulate to "sexual contact" so she didn't have to talk about all those blow jobs in the speaker's office on the stand, and last but not least, "Catholic Carrot Waxer Calista" who converted Newt--how ironic!).

We can revisit all of his Clinton scolding--all happening while, as we now know, he was getting his hummanahummanahummana under the SPEEEKAH's desk!

Also, Newt has no staff--they all quit on him.

He looks "elder-statesman-ish" until you look closely. The paint is flaking, there are dents barely filled in with Bond-O, the tires are bald and deflated, and he's just a tired old asshole with a frighteningly ambitious wife. He may surge, but then he'll pancake, I think. She's just not likeable, and I heard that when I was skulking around DC, and she was a staffer on HIS staff--FROM his staff. I don't think she's changed. If anything, she looks even more fake and insincere now.

[Faux pas]

18. The Newt is my pick. Have we recovered from his last big

adventure yet?

[Marr]

20. None. I'm told the president is helpless without massive majorities in both houses of Congress.

Many of the same people who so regularly assure everyone that Obama can't do anything also talk about the scary consequences of a GOP presidency. You can't have it both ways.

[Populist_Prole]

21. Romney: a mixture of being the most electable and an unabashed plutocrat

Huntsman is being pushed in the shadows, but given the shifting of the bar to the right, could be considered a more or less mainstream center-right type that'll be in Wall St's pocket...basically a Republican Obama dare I say.

The rest are too nutty to be even considered electable....and so the dangerous part doesn't apply.

[Major Hogwash]

22. Bachmann, she's totally crazy. The mainstream media would endorse her in a heartbeat!!

As the first woman candidate of a major party to run as that party's candidate.

[KeyserSoze87]

23. Romney is just as dangerous as all the other candidates.

However, there is one unique quality that he has. Rather than being inept like all the other people in the GOP clown car, Romney comes off as very manipulative. When he gets the nomination, it's likely he'll try to look like a moderate to win over independents and Obama supporters, and he'll then push forth the radical Tea Party agenda in the most subtle and insidious way possible. Look at his Medicare plan, for example. He claims that he wants to reform Medicare so that recipients can choose to either stay on the current program, or get subsidies for private insurance, but I'm certain he's lying about this. I think what he really wants to do is to turn all of Medicare into a privatized voucher system like the Paul Ryan Budget. After all, one of Romney's senior advisors said that "in that respect, it’s exactly the same exact thing as Ryan's plan." Once he gets elected after pretending to be a moderate, Romney will then show his true colors and work with the teabaggers to privatize everything and turn our society into a corporatocracy. Don't believe Romney's lies!