Newt

Of the number of current and past actions by Newt Gingrich that have totally turned me off from his candidacy that I reference in my post, Palin, Newt, Mitt, and the GOP Establishment yesterday, two of the most egregious are his whinging about being the victim and his increasingly desperate and angry accusations against Mitt Romney.

It says a lot about the character (lack thereof) of Newt Gingrich when he can stand at a podium and with a straight face not only complain about how vicious and horrible Romney is for his negative attacks on Newt, but then turn around and lay an attack on Mitt Romney for cancelling kosher meals for holocaust survivors...

This is a particularly slimy attack - more so in that it is pathetically a major stretch in an effort to deal a smear.  Alana Goodman in Commentary does a real good job at exposing the vapid logic behind Gingrich's attack.

But with all of this, Gingrich doubled down and had robo calls going throughout Florida today pressing the same meme - that Romney cancelled kosher meals for holocaust survivors in Massachusetts.

The facts are simple.  In trying to address Massachusetts's budget issues, Governor Romney vetoed a request to fund $600,000 for nursing homes to have their own separate kosher kitchens in each facility to provide kosher meals.  He believed that kosher meals could be provided by these nursing home facilities via either centralized kitchens or with prepackaged kosher meals.  At no point was Romney advocating denying kosher meals to Jewish nursing home residents.  The Massachusetts legislature overrode Romney's veto on the additional $600,000 in funding, so nursing homes got the additional funds to maintain their own kosher kitchen in addition to their normal kitchen.

This is a far cry from saying that Mitt Romney wanted to deny kosher meals to Jewish nursing home residents.  In government, officials should be looking as to how they can eliminate duplicate facilities or if there are more cost effective ways in maintaining services - like using prepackaged foods or centralized dedicated kosher kitchens for groups of nursing homes.

The hypocrisy of Gingrich is far too reminiscent of the hypocrisy of the progressive left.  The desperation of Gingrich is far too reminiscent of the thin skin, hubris, and petulance of Barack Obama.

Based on the exit polls from Florida, Gingrich is going to lose very badly to Mitt Romney - who could very well achieve a majority (over 50% ) of the vote.  I suspect that Gingrich's actions in the wake of his poor debate performances last week combined with his negative scorched earth approach turned off some of his supporters and added to Romney's totals.