Once upon a time, former Republican Speaker of the House/Clinton-era insurrectionist Newton Leroy Gingrich was considered the top pick for the GOP’s vice presidential candidate. But, it was not to be. Instead, he was passed over for a certain cornfield governor. Irritating? I’ll bet, especially considering that Mr. Gingrich is one of the top Republican personalities staging a Trump intervention.
During an interview with Fox Business’ Maria Bartiromo, Mr. Gingrich spoke candidly about his feelings toward the antics of the Republican presidential nominee:
“Trump is still behaving like as though it was the primaries and there are 17 candidates. He has not made the transition.”
Wait… So it’s perfectly acceptable to act like a racist, misogynist, xenophobic ass during the primaries, but not after securing the party’s nomination? Is that how this works? Here I was thinking the political system should be a professional affair where minds engage each other in competition for national support. I didn’t know the primaries were supposed to be a cavalcade of insidious fuckery.
Gingrich continued, noting that Trump is “not yet performing at the level that you need to” for a presidential candidate, whatever that means. He practically scolded Trump for his spats with current Speaker of the House Paul Ryan and Arizona Sen. John McCain, then added:
“Some of what Trump has done has been very self-destructive.”
But more damning than the comments Gingrich made on Fox Business were the comments he made to the Washington Post about Trump’s behavior and how it will affect his race against Hillary Clinton.
“The current race is which of these two is the more unacceptable, because right now neither of them is acceptable. Trump is helping her to win by proving he is more unacceptable than she is. Anybody who is horrified by Hillary should hope that Trump will take a deep breath and learn some new skills. He cannot win the presidency operating the way he is now. She can’t be bad enough to elect him if he’s determined to make this many mistakes.”
Is it possible Gingrich is being petty because Mike Pence, of all people, was chosen to occupy the White House broom closet should Trump be elected? Sure. I could get behind that. The Republicans have been pretty petty lately.
But at the same time, we’re passed the point where we can compare the Donald’s behavior to how a presidential candidate is expected to act. He has acted like this since his bad hair was real, so Gingrich just needs to get over it. The reason why Trump is the nominee is because primary voters wanted him. They wanted him despite the fact he acts like Eric Cartman on a regular basis.
So maybe it isn’t Trump who needs the intervention. Perhaps it’s actually Republican voters…
h/t Mediaite
