It’s true that Ronald Reagan knew how to read a lot of words on a teleprompter. But he didn’t feel the need to speak it at 5X normal speed.
Oh Newt. Again? Your track record isn’t all that…
In the same cloud of outrage and optimism that has been wrapped around him all year, Gingrich took to the phones on the afternoon of Election Day still predicting that the President would be made to pay for his sins and that the Republicans would pick up six to 30 seats. But as the hours passed, the numbers just kept getting worse, and by 10 p.m. the Republicans were barely breaking even in the House. Then another seat looked vulnerable. Then seven more. Then, around 10:45, 13 seats. “At that point, we thought we lost the House,” one said later.
When the last returns came in, Gingrich had lost five seats–a setback not matched since 1822. “Well,” said Gingrich when it was all over, “we all misjudged this one.”
The next morning Gingrich held a gripe session by conference call, letting others vent about everything: the Republicans’ utter absence of a message, the Democrats’ lethally effective get-out-the-vote effort. “They were unbelievable,” one of the leaders said to Newt. “They kicked our ass on the ground.” Gingrich was mostly quiet. He listened. “He was in a state of shock,” says one participant.
It was different an hour later during the “listen only” conference call with members. This time Newt talked a lot, but he made no sense. He blamed the election on the unions, on black turnout driven by scare-tactic radio ads, on the fact that the Senate had failed to take up the House’s $80 billion tax cut, and of course on the media for hyping the Monica scandal and blotting out the Republican message. Said one member who listened in: “It was very lame and not credible. He just doesn’t get it. He’s the problem. I don’t see how you get over this bump in the road without getting rid of him.”
They got rid of him.
But sure. Listen to Newt, Republicans! He knows what he’s talking about.
Happy Hollandaise, everyone!