Wednesday, November 23, 2011

Debate advice for Rick Perry – slam Newt! - Newt Gingrich - Salon.com

Debate advice for Rick Perry – slam Newt! - Newt Gingrich - Salon.com

This is Texas Gov. Rick Perry’s moment. The GOP primary campaign has always been an effort to winnow the many candidates down to two: Mitt Romney and Not Mitt Romney. It’s got to be killing Perry (assuming he feels any pain at all) to watch Gingrich emerge as the latest Not Mitt.
Gingrich is still surging in the polls – the latest to find him in first place is CNN – and while I think his history of selling himself to corporate America will ultimately turn off Tea Partyers, what do I know about Tea Partyers, anyway? I try to give them credit for ideological consistency – they supposedly hate crony capitalism, and Newt is its poster boy – but I may be politically naive in that.
That’s where Rick Perry comes in. The guy’s got enough money to be the Not Mitt. He’s never lost an election. Surely he’s got to have more substance than it’s seemed so far – he can’t really be a stoner frat boy let loose in a presidential race. Can he? I think he can redeem a series of horrible debate performances with a good pummeling of Gingrich Tuesday night.
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Joan Walsh
Joan Walsh is Salon's editor at large. 

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