WP: Gingrich Says Ohio Race (Hackett) Holds Lesson for GOP

Gingrich Says Ohio Race Holds Lesson for GOP
By Dan Balz and Thomas B. Edsall
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, August 4, 2005; Page A04


Former House speaker Newt Gingrich (Ga.) warned fellow Republicans yesterday not to ignore the implications of the party's narrow victory in Tuesday's special election in Ohio, saying the public mood heading into next year's midterm elections appears to helping Democrats and hurting Republicans.

"It should serve as a wake-up call to Republicans, and I certainly take it very seriously in analyzing how the public mood evidences itself," Gingrich said. "Who is willing to show up and vote is different than who answers a public opinion poll. Clearly, there's a pretty strong signal for Republicans thinking about 2006 that they need to do some very serious planning and not just assume that everything is going to be automatically okay."

Gingrich's reaction came after Democrat Paul Hackett, an Iraq war veteran and vocal critic of President Bush's Iraq policy, came within 4,000 votes of upsetting Republican Jean Schmidt in the solidly GOP 2nd Congressional District in southwestern Ohio.

Schmidt and Hackett competed to fill a vacancy created when Rep. Rob Portman (R) resigned to become U.S. trade representative. Schmidt had won a contentious Republican primary and was heavily favored in a district that has been in GOP hands for nearly four decades. Bush won the district with 64 percent of the vote in November.

Republican apathy, dissatisfaction with Bush and congressional Republicans, a GOP scandal in Ohio, and Hackett's energetic, anti-Iraq campaign all may have contributed to keep the race closer than expected, according to strategists in both parties....


http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/03/AR2005080301899.html

Gingrich sound scared

for trying a stunt using humidity as a cause for producing 4000 recently found votes -- kaka-poo!

Go on as normal. Ignore this. Hackett ran as a republican. Keep telling yourselves that. Just ignore this kerfuffle. Nobody likes democrats. Republicans will win every seat in the house and senate. Ignore the Hackett race. Hackett ran as a republican. That's right. Keep saying it. Gingrich is clueless. He has no idea what he's saying. Go about your lives as normal. People like all these big corporate bills. They really, really do. Go on as normal.

implement them for the 2006 campaign? The Repukes or the Dems"

I'm betting Rove was working on a "counter insurgency" strategy before the final results were in.

I'm betting that the DLC clowns were wiping the sweat from their pale white forheads and smiling that Hackett lost.

I'm betting Howard Dean will use Hackett's campaign to energize the base and recruit candidates to challenge Repukes.

:toast:

The AEI is the American Enterprise Institute, widely regarded as a neoconservative front, and with indirect funding ties to Richard Mellon Scaife. Michael Ledeen is also a prominent member thereof.

The COG is the Continuity Of Government plan, instituted by Eisenhower in the event of a mass killing of government leaders. Bush activated it on 9/11 (presumably on a standby basis), and informed a shocked Democrat minority (the Republicans all knew) on 1 March 2002. Doubtless he's appointed 100% far right wing ideologues to it.

officials now.