I like vigorous debates, like the one conservatives are having about Newt vs. Romney.

Open debates are good in a democracy.

One of the best things about debates is that both sides can call each other on logic or evidence.  But the attacks I've seen on Newt from soi-disant conservatives are launched without much logic or evidence at all. 

They seem silly beyond belief. 

Conservative pundits have caught that liberal mud-slinging disease. But rational adults don't think that way.  I'm still waiting for a decisive piece of evidence against Newt.  Mud-slinging, rumors, and anecdotes are strictly for liberal lowbrows.  I want evidence.

If the biggest criticism is that Newt has a sizable ego, or that he spins off ideas that he has to take back later when he's had a chance to think about them, well, I'll give him a pass, speaking only for myself.  But usually I like new ideas better than no ideas at all.  If you're going to be a policy wonk, I hope you check your ideas over and over again until they are as good as possible.  If you have to confess that you changed your mind after thinking some more, well, bully for you.

I'll take an open-minded thinker any time against a rigid Alinsky ideologue.

Wouldn't you?

Newt's overheated critics don't seem to get that we don't have a choice between Newt Gingrich and Jesus Christ.  Or between Newt and Ronald Reagan, or Newt and Abe Lincoln.

No, the Fates have seen to it that we've got Newt vs. Not.

That would be Not Romney, the most unknowable candidate in history, excepting only the Big O Himself.

So when our conservative heroes start yelping for Gingrich's blood, it follows with iron logic that they are supporting Romney.

It's Choice A or Choice B, folks, with an outside chance for a dark horse.

Which makes it really hard to believe one WaPo conservative who is gunning for Gingrich, but who also claims not to be for Romney.  Which leaves us with what, exactly?  I think that's a Not Not, and it makes my head spin.

Compared to Romney, Gingrich is practically carved into Mount Rushmore.  He's got a track record, and contrary to The Big O, he didn't just get away with voting present.

So we have Newt vs. Not vs. The Mind-locked One. 

Right now the chances are that one of them will be president of the United States.

So Newt's got enemies.  Harry Truman pointed out that "[i]f you want a friend in Washington, get a dog."  Ronald Reagan made enemies in D.C. George Washington did.  Lincoln made so many enemies that he got shot.  Making enemies in Washington just means you've accomplished something.

Given the decades of gross misgovernment we see from the Permanent Ruling Class infesting D.C., I'm kind of pleased that Newt doesn't have too many friends there.  The last thing we want is a Republican president with lots of IOUs tied to the Washington mockocracy.

Still, the funniest critique of Newt is that he has a big ego.

Gosh darn it!  We can't have that in our nation's capital, can we?

I'm looking for a really humble politician who is running for the job, but I can't see any on the horizon.

All I see is a man who doesn't like this country at all, and who is constantly dropping little "up yours" remarks about the United States everywhere he goes.

This man has an ego the size of the Graf Zeppelin.  

After watching him for four years, the single most impressive thing about our Current Occupant is the size of his Napoleonic ego.  The word "I" is far and away his favorite word in English.  Followed by "me."

Remember those styrofoam Greek columns at his victory speech in Denver?  Remember his Berlin speech, copying Marx and Engels with "Citizens of the World, Unite!"?  Remember the Nobel Peace Prize Just for Running While Black?  Remember the Einstein Theory of the U.S. Constitution, as credited to BHO by Harvard Law Professor Larry Tribe?  Remember the unexplained Air Force One flight buzzing Lady Liberty in the first weeks of his term?

Compared to the Ego That Ate the White House, Newt Gingrich looks like a man who will pray on bended knee when the responsibilities of office seem too much for a human being to bear.

Like Lincoln, Washington, and Truman.

I'll vote for that.