Yesterday’s most significant news in the race for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination came, not from Constitution Hall in the nation’s capitol where the Heritage Foundation, CNN and American Enterprise Institute hosted a candidate debate, but rather in Missouri where Newt Gingrich’s campaign was the only campaign that failed to file for Missouri’s February 7th primary.
True, the February 7th primary is not binding, but Missouri officials say the results help guide how caucus goers will vote in March. All of the other candidates thought it was worth the investment to pay the state’s filing fee. Newt wanted to save his money. Which is really what his candidacy is all about, anyway.
Last night, when asked what he would do with illegal immigrants already in the United States, Gingrich proposed, “something like a World War II Selective Service Board that, frankly, reviews the people who are here.” This answer may make Gingrich sound like a smart history professor whose new book you may want to buy, but it is terrible public policy. A system of local boards empowered to selectively enforce immigration law (the way local Selective Service Boards decided who was and was not subject to the draft) would quickly devolve into a de facto amnesty. Illegal immigrants from around the nation would flock to liberal havens like Berkeley, California, or Cambridge, Massachusetts, where the local boards would become rubber stamps for all applicants. Serious Republican primary voters will eventually recognize this as the broad amnesty that it is.
Newt’s amnesty musings will help him sell books, will help him charge higher speaker fees, and will open more doors for Fannie/PhRMA-style payments to Newt Inc. Newt generated new angles for making a ton of money down the road last night, but it’s doubtful that he won many new votes.
GOP Debate
The Washington Examiner‘s Michael Barone: “As for Mitt Romney, aside from what I (but perhaps not many Republican primary voters) consider his shameful attempt to demagogue the immigration issue, he did very well. … We heard some of his standard riffs—Barack Obama doesn’t think this is an exceptional country; I do—but they’re pretty powerful and, at least as a description of Obama, pretty fact-based too. He was strong on Afghanistan, strong on the defense budget, strong on Syria (though he made a case that Rick Perry’s proposal for a no-fly-zone there wasn’t responsive to current realities).”
The Washington Post‘s Jen Rubin: “Gingrich gave some long-winded answers on Pakistan and foreign aid. He repeated the conventional wisdom among conservatives on Iran. He just didn’t stand out. In part because most of the questions came from American Enterprise Institute scholars, he couldn’t bash the moderator or the media. Without a punching bag, he seemed undistingushed.”
National Review‘s Rich Lowry: Newt was commanding, showing his decades of engagement with these issues. He seemed less irritable than usual and at ease with his place of new prominence in the race. … I suspect Gingrich is going to have a very hard time defending the idea of creating a permanent class of second-class citizens, which is what the “red card” proposal sounds like.”
National Review‘s Victor Davis Hanson: “Romney once again shows that he is sober and judicious on foreign policy in a way that some of the others come off a little scary. He does well counter-punching and avoids the crowd-pleasing gestures.”
National Review‘s John J. Miller: “Last night’s debate winner: think tanks. The questions from the men and women affiliated with the American Enterprise Institute and the Heritage Foundation showed that journalists shouldn’t have a monopoly on these events.”
Around the Bigs
The Washington Examiner, Occupy DC expects to be raided, tells campers to remove drugs: Occupy DC leaders do not expect U.S. Park Police to dismantle their camp, but they are preparing for a tent-by-tent search by law enforcement authorities.
ABC News, Obama New Hampshire Jobs Speech Interrupted By Occupy Protesters: Occupy Wall Street protesters interrupted President Obama’s jobs speech in Manchester, New Hampshire, yesterday, “You must stop the assault on our 1st amendment rights. Your silence sends a message that police brutality is acceptable. Banks got bailed out. We got sold out.” The protesters were eventually drowned out by the crowd chanting, “Obama! Obama!”
CNBC, Demonstrators Plan to Occupy Retailers on Black Friday: The Occupy Wall Street movement is planning to occupy retailers on Black Friday to protest “the business that are in the pockets of Wall Street.” Organizers are encouraging consumers to either occupy or boycott publicly traded retailers.
The Wall Street Journal, Investors Bullish on Fed Tips: A group of investors and analysts have access to top Fed officials who give them a chance at early clues to the central bank’s next policy moves.
The Washington Post, ‘Climate-gate’ resurfaces with a new round of e-mails: A hacker has released a second round of e-mails between climate scientists plotting on how best “manipulate” the data to support “the cause” of more government control over the energy sector of the economy.
The New York Times, Republican Might Quit Labor Board: National Labor Relations Board member Brian Hayes is threatening to resign his position if his Democratic colleagues approve a new regulation that would allow union organizer to call surprise elections on unsuspecting firms. If Hayes resigns, the Board would not have the quorum needed to adopt new regulations.
The Salt Lake Tribune, Feds sue to block Utah immigration law: The Obama Justice Department sued Utah yesterday, claiming that the state’s new law, which require law enforcement to verify the legal status of those arrested for class A misdemeanors or felonies, is inconsistent with Obama’s decision not to enforce our nation’s immigration laws. Obama has also sued Arizona, Alabama and South Carolina for their laws on immigration enforcement.
The New York Times, Despite Threat of Cuts, Pentagon Officials Made No Contingency Plans: Pentagon officials pushed back against congressional plans to cut defense spending yesterday, telling journalists that they were not even going to plan for the possibility that Congress cut follow through with their proposed cuts.
Campaign 2012
Romney: The Associated Press’ Phil Elliot reports that Sen. John Thune, R-S.D., will officially endorse Mitt Romney today.
National Review’s Jim Geraghty does a then-and-now comparison of Obama statements on the campaign trail about economic recovery in February and this week.
Righty Playbook
The Washington Examiner‘s Tim Carney explains why guest worker programs are corporate welfare: “A typical employer in a free market has only the power to stop paying his worker or possibly sue him if he doesn’t perform promised services. But under guest-worker programs, the employer gains the power of deportation.”
Power Line’s John Hinderaker picks his favorite emails out of the new batched of leaked Climategate documents.
RedState‘s Erick Erickson compares Mitt Romney to Harriet Miers: “Mitt Romney is the Harriet Miers of the 2012 election cycle. He is only a conservative because certain Washington conservatives tell us he is conservative. These same Washington conservatives said the same about Harriet Miers back in 2005.”
Lefty Playbook
The New Yorker‘s Ryan Lizza asks, “Why Didn’t Reporters Call Romney a Liar?” over his new ad quoting Obama out of context.
The Washington Post‘s Ezra Klein explains why he thinks some Republicans support the Simpson-Bowles deficit reduction plan: because Obama opposes it.
The Cable‘s Josh Rogin previews the Obama campaigns charge that Mitt Romney is a flip-flopper on foreign policy issues.
