In U.S. News, Paul Bedard offers up some weak tea suggesting that maybe Newt Gingrich's campaign might not be over yet.
Either way, the big-thinking Republican, his supporters, and presidential political experts sense that Gingrich, left for dead by the political class weeks ago when his staff abruptly quit and stories surfaced about his big-dollar Tiffany's account, is on the way back. The reason for the emerging Newt 2.0? His effective performance in the last debate that inspired supporters to boost online donations after he assailed the deficit "super committee" while spelling out detailed solutions to fixing the economy.
"He moved out of the irrelevant category and now he has some standing," says a GOP analyst. "His strengths are his ideas and translating them at a debate. Given that there are lots more debates, he has a chance to win."
The Gingrich surge is seen in some polls. In Missouri and Louisiana, for example, he is fourth behind Texas Gov. Rick Perry, Mitt Romney, and Rep. Michele Bachmann.
Fourth place in Missouri and Louisiana? Look out Rick and Mitt, you're about to experience the lukewarm breeze as Newtmentum passes you right by!
Actually, as Slate points out, being in fourth place might sound ... um, okay, but it doesn't mean much when the top three are sucking up virtually all of the support.
In Missouri, Romney leads with 25 percent, Perry is next with 22 percent, and Bachmann comes third at 13 percent. Gingrich has 7 percent. In Louisiana, it's Perry at 30 percent, Bachmann at 16 percent, Romney at 15 percent, and Gingrich at 9 percent.
Later in the U.S. News piece he compares himself to - who else? - St. Ronnie, who evidently "took a while to build momentum."
He's called Rick Perry "the flavor of the month" - well, OK, he might have a point there.
Newt has latched on to the Supercommittee as one means of grabbing a little attention. However, as that article comments,
For the moment, Gingrich is failing to gain traction in national polls. In a Quinnipiac University poll released on Wednesday, the former congressional leader pulled 4 percent. He did slightly better with 6 percent in a survey from CNN/ORC International released this week. While there have been some polls showing Gingrich polling in the high single digits in South Carolina, he has not done as well in surveys of Iowa -- where he placed eighth in the Republican straw poll held earlier in the month -- and New Hampshire.
He went to his old home state of Georgia for a fish fry a few days ago, but it didn't stop Herman Cain from winning a little straw poll there. Newt came in fourth in that one, too.
I don't suppose Newt is going to give up any time soon though since if you're not actually willing to do the work of running, it doesn't hurt you to stay in the race. He probably is mainly sitting around at AEI or wherever he works these days, taking the occasional phone call and updating his campaign website.