Salon had a good article on how, in addition to the grassroots conservatives, the GOP itself is purging him because he’s embarrassing them. It’s probably all they can do, considering how much everyone hates him:

http://www.salon.com/news/politics/war_room/2011/05/18/gingrich_republicans_message

Florida does not allow cross-over voting in the primaries. It does not have “open” primaries. Democrats cannot vote in the Republican primary, unless they switch parties, and that has to happen at least one month before election day. Cross-over voting in the primaries did occur in many states in 2008. But I can’t think Florida was one of them.

This, plus Newt’s behavior in the Ryna kerfluffle, have me thinking that Newt is being deliberately set up by the liberal establishment to take the Republican mantle, just as McCain was in 2008.

We now know that the Obama campaiogn WANTED to face McCain all along, because they thought he would be the easiest Republican candidate to defeat. So, they gamed the system at every pass to take out his competition–using things like the “open” Republican primary in Florida (coupled with the Democrats’ agreement not to campaign there) that allowed Democrat voters to flood the polls to vote, en masse, for the “worst” Republican (McCain).

I fear that’s what is happening here, Alinsky style, behind the scenes. Newt’s betrayal of Ryan, and the republican base, was so deliberate and reprehensible that under normal circumstances I would judge his candidacy to be finished. However, so long as Obama faces no primary challenger there are going to be millions of potential Democrat voters going to the polls to vote in the open Republican primaries, again for the “weakest” Republican candidate (Newt).

Just as happened in 2008, we may end up with a GOP presidential candidate completely at odds with the base of the party and chosen, essentially, by Democrats.

And I can’t believe that after the groundswell of Tea Party activity over the last few years, including the historic 2010 election, that he actually felt comfortable touting his establishment Republican (i.e. RINO)views. While I’d like a candidate with some experience, I don’t want anyone who has/had been in Congress long enough to become more interested in pleasing his beltway friends than, you know, representing the people.

Wonder who they are and what their motives happen to be?

Hmmm.

Used to call him Gangrene. I think he might have calculated that he could run in a cleft, splitting right and left, sacrificing Paul Ryan’s plan to do so. But this time the nation is in dire straits, and such cheap political strategems are contemptible.

I had a similar feeling about Karl Rove when I saw him on a talk show: he was all about coldblooded calculation of how to get his man into power, and to hell with the principles. I can’t remember what principle he rubbished, but it was a big one that shocked me.