Politico’s homepage top headline is The right drops a bomb on Newt featuring photos of Ann Coulter, Tom DeLay, Elliot Abrams and Matt Drudge.
Just like in December, the rise of Newt has caused panic in Republican circles.
In December the charge was led by National Review, and now it’s being led by Matt Drudge, as reflected in this image from Marooned in Marin:
For several days Drudge has been running almost around-the-clock negative banners against Newt, hyping negatives and burying news which contradicts the Romney campaign narrative that Newt was anti-Reagan.
Against the anti-Newt crusade stands a wealth of counter-viewpoints of people who were in a position to know and who share very differenct recollections of Newt and Reagan, via Josh Painter in the comments:
Reagan Nat’l Security Advisor Bud McFarlane: http://bit.ly/zd9eAFReagan Economist Art Laffer: http://bit.ly/xEDETiReagan WH political director Jeffrey Lord: http://bit.ly/zw2ZMbReagan Policy Analyst Peter Ferrara http://bit.ly/zq1QxIReagan media consultant Richard Quinn: http://on.msnbc.com/y2sPM2Reagan’s Speechwriting Dir. Bently Elliott: http://thedc.com/xOkDvAReagan’s older son Michael Reagan: http://bit.ly/yYVy7LReagan’s beloved wife Nancy: http://bit.ly/zrWvAw
I’ll add to that Peter Robinson, former Reagan speechwriter, who wrote the historic Berlin Wall address in which President Reagan urged Mikhail Gorbachev to “tear down this wall!”:
Newt shared the frustrations of many conservatives, including, from time to time, me, that the President permitted the bureaucracy to prove persistently feckless, undermining his program–as you’ll recall if you’re of a certain age, conservatives were always insisting that the President’s staff should “let Reagan be Reagan.” If Newt mouthed off, giving vent to these frustrations, so be it. He was in Congress. That was, in a sense, his job. And at one time or another, every conservative of any standing felt exasperated or worried–and urged the President not to go soft either on Communism or on our own bureaucracy. Newt’s comments here place him in the company of William F. Buckley, Jr.–WFB vented his frustrations more artfully, but he vented them–and I’d have thought that for our friends at NR that would be quite good enough.
Drudge has 30 million visits a day on his side. We have history on our side. Make it known.
Update: David Kenner of Foreign Policy magazine:
CLICK HERE FOR FULL VERSION OF THIS STORY
