Tomorrow night, Newt Gingrich will kick off the third iteration of his quest for the presidency.
The move comes less than 45 days after the launch of Newt 2.0, and follows the mass exodus of top staffers from his campaign.
That split was the result of irreconcilable differences over the best way to sell Newt to the American public; Gingrich believes he can run a stock photo-backed campaign, while his former staffers were intent on running a traditional campaign — the kind backed by actual people.
Despite the turmoil, Newt says he's still in it to win it.
And really, things can only get better for him at this point.
Morning lineup:
Meet the Press: Debate between DNC Chair/Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz and RNC Chair Rence Priebus; Republican Presidential Candidate Rick Santorum; Roundtable: Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed (D), Republican Strategist Mike Murphy, Richard Wolfe (MSNBC) and Kim Strassel (Wall Street Journal).
Face the Nation: House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-MD); Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI); Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-GA).
This Week: Former Labor Secretary Robert Reich; Former New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine (D); Sen. Richard Shelby (R-AL); Jonathan Karl (ABC News); Claire Shipman (ABC News); Former Assistant Pentagon Press Secretary Torie Clarke; Former wife of French President Nicolas Sarkozy Cecilia Attias; Roundtable: Democratic Strategist Donna Brazile, Peggy Noonan (Wall Street Journal), Jake Tapper (ABC News) and George Will (Washington Post).
Fox News Sunday: Republican Presidential Candidate Tim Pawlenty; Roundtable: Brit Hume (Fox News), Bill Kristol (Weekly Standard), Mara Liasson (NPR/FNC) and Juan Williams (Fox News).
State of the Union: Sen. Kelly Ayotte (R-NH); Rep. Charlie Bass (R-NH); Former New Hampshire Gov. John Sununu (R); Former Sen. John Sununu (R-NH); Philip Rucker (Washington Post); Neil King (Wall Street Journal); Reliable Sources: Chris Cuomo (ABC); Amy Holmes (America's Morning News); American University Professor Jane Hall; Dana Milbank (Washington Post).
The Chris Matthews Show: Andrea Mitchell (NBC News); David Ignatius (Washington Post); Rana Foroohar (TIME); John Heilemann (New York Magazine).
Fareed Zakaria GPS: Eliot Spitzer (CNN); Conservative Commentator Ann Coulter; Chrystia Freeland (Reuters); British Historian Andrew Roberts; Former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger; David Ignatius (Washington Post).
Evening lineup:
60 Minutes will feature: a profile of microbiologist Craig Venter (preview); a report on a Southern publisher's sanitized version of Huckleberry Finn that replaces the word "nigger" with "slave" over 200 times (preview); and, an interview with Oscar-winning actor Colin Firth (preview).
On Comedy Central:
Jon Stewart held a press conference where he took responsibility for inadequately covering "Weinergate."
The Daily Show
Monday: Author Alex Prud'homme
Tuesday: Screenwriter/Director/Producer J.J. Abrams
Wednesday: TBD
Thursday: Rerun
And Stephen Colbert set out on a journey to prove Sarah Palin right.
The Colbert Report
Monday: Former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger
Tuesday: Author Janny Scott
Wednesday: Keith Olbermann (Current TV)
Thursday: Rerun
Speaking of the former half-term governor:
Aides to former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher didn't exactly have anything nice to say.
Here’s a hint to Sarah Palin: If your political followers call themselves the "Tea Party," they might not be greeted so warmly by the British. Palin said last week that while on the way to Sudan, she hoped to stop over in Britain and see Margaret Thatcher, who Palin said she "so admires." But Thatcher aides said Tuesday that Palin is likely to be "thwarted" if she tries to see Thatcher, and not only because of the former prime minister’s ailing health. "Lady Margaret would not be seeing Sarah Palin," one source said. "That would be belittling for Margaret. Sarah Palin is nuts."
Meanwhile:
Michele Bachmann's new campaign manager, Ed Rollins, compared and contrasted the babes of the GOP.
Bachmann will "be so much more substantive," Rollins said. "People are going to say, 'I gotta make a choice and go with the intelligent woman who's every bit as attractive.'" [...]
"Sarah has not been serious over the last couple of years," he said. "She got the vice presidential thing handed to her, she didn't go to work in the sense of trying to gain more substance, she gave up her governorship."
"Michele Bachmann and others [have] worked hard," he said. "She has been a leader of the Tea Party which is a very important element here, she has been an attorney, she has done important things with family values."
Rollins was singing a completely different tune about Bachmann just a few months ago.
And in other news:
Matt Drudge received the coveted endorsement of the Council of Conservative Citizens.
Last week, conservative mega-aggregator the Drudge Report caught flack for posting "a slew of run-of-the-mill summer crime stories that happen to involve black people and suggestively weav[ing] them into a nationwide race riot." Drudge posted 10 separate headlines — including a massive, above-the-logo one — about this supposed violent "urban" crime wave. Meanwhile, crime is at a 40-year low. But it wasn’t just the left that noticed. This week, the white nationalist hate group the Council of Conservative Citizens (CCC) gleefully reported that the "Drudge Report currently resembles CofCC.org." What is the CCC? A group that opposes interracial marriage, describes black people as "a retrograde species of humanity," and networks with racist skinheads. "Kudos to Drudge for making friends in low places," the Southern Poverty Law Center quips.
Checkmate!
- Trix