Mitt, Ron, Rick, And Newt: The Pockmarked GOP Class Of 2012

Newt Gingrich is “unstable.” He is a big man of big ideas, but he lacks the discipline. He owes a half million dollars at Tiffany’s. He pampered himself with a two-week Grecian cruise last summer. He returned tanned and without a campaign staff. And then his ex-wife—the second one—started talking.

But the Tea Party spotted him a mulligan. Call Gingrich what you will: a “loose-cannon,” “philanderer,” or “hypocrite,” but you have to call him a sonofagun on the debate floor. He could be spacy, sure. He would rant about bases on the moon. But Newt Gingrich alone had the intellectual firepower to go toe-to-toe with President Obama.

Mitt Romney, however, had the bankroll. And he lost the civility. He leveled Gingrich with $5 million in negative campaign ads in Iowa. And then added $20 million more in Florida. He brought in a new debate coach and knocked Gingrich back on immigration.

So now Newt Gingrich plays the jilted spoiler. Michigan TV time is too expensive. The debates dried up and Gingrich can only lie in wait ‘til Super Tuesday. The big man of big ideas is now reduced to an embittered “also-ran.” His only hope that Rick Santorum splits the vote with Romney all the way to a brokered convention in Tampa.

Mitt Romney is “weird.” Obliviously wealthy. His first name is Willard. Mitt Romney is the conviction-less son of Michigan who wanted Detroit to go bankrupt.

Romney can’t do photo-ops. He looks the part, sure. He cracked People’s 50 Most Beautiful People list in 2002. He stands regally atop bails of hay. But then he speaks. And beneath that perfectly-coiffed mane trembles a high-strung control freak who cannot relate.

George W. Bush seemed like a good guy to have a beer with even though he didn’t drink. And well, Mitt Romney doesn’t drink. But you wouldn’t want to have a beer with him even if he did. Ask him about NASCAR and he’ll tell you he’s pals with the owners. Ask him where he’s from and he’ll tell you about the “right height” of Michigan’s trees. Romney does spreadsheets, not small talk. He tweets painfully-forced laundry day pictures. And the message is clear: Mitt Romney is trying too hard.

Mitt Romney smacks of John Kerry all over again. Another effete Massachusetts moderate with squishy positions and wooden social graces. John Kerry kite-surfed off Nantucket. Mitt Romney quadruples the size of his $12 million California house because it is “inadequate for the [family’s] needs.”