Newt’s Arrogance Again on Display

26 December 2011 |permalink | email article

ONLY a few days ago Gingrich declared confidently that he would get his name on the ballot for the Republican presidential primary in Virginia. He said he already had the necessary 10,000 signatures and perhaps 3,000 more for safety’s sake. Turns out that the Virginia Republican party announced via Twitter that Gingrich had failed to submit enough signatures by the Thursday deadline, highlighting the organizational challenges in his campaign. It’s bad news for Gingrich in his adopted home state and creates an image problem of some magnitude, notably because Virginia in one of 10 Super Tuesday states that vote on March 6. By then eleven states, including biggies like Colorado, Florida and Michigan, will have voted. Larry Sabato, a political scientist at the University of Virginia, told The New York Times that “this sends yet another signal to Republicans that Gingrich is not able to organize.” Gingrich’s campaign chairman said “voters have a right to vote for any top contender, especially leading candidates.”

Quotable

“We will have a difficult year. But it will be an interesting year. It will be our year.”—Boris Akunin, a novelist. addressing tens of thousands of antigovernment protestors in Moscow last week which has created a growing problem for Vladimir Putin in his 2012 bid to be re-elected president.

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