Newt Gingrich said what? It's going to be 2008 all over again.

Well, I watched the much maligned Romney Interview with Bret Baier and while it wasn't his finest hour, I didn't find it as big a fumble as others have. I do think that many of the charges against Mitt are based on statements taken out of context or twisted to justify false claims against him. He made a good point in stating that if he were really a flip-flopper, he would have disowned the Massachusetts health care law that he helped pass. At the time, it should be remembered, there were quite a few conservatives supporting an individual mandate. As he points out, Gingrich has changed his positions on mandated health insurance and on Cap and Trade and been allowed to dismiss them as mistakes. It must be galling to have to deal with such a double standard. Newt claims a religious conversion, which would be fine with me if I had seen more evidence of one than just his saying so. His lavish spending and "consulting" fees have occurred during his present marriage, and who knows how a return to being a big shot in Washington would affect him, or, at nearly age 70 when he would take office, what the stresses of the job would do to his health? I'm becoming more and more convinced that there is more anti-Mormonism at work than people are willing to admit. It certainly doesn't show up in polls, but there has been a concerted campaign of preaching among evangelicals that the LDS religion is not Christian, but a "cult." All that one needs to play that card about them is to mention the word "Christian," as Huckabee so subtly did in 2008. In the end, he only succeeded in cancelling out Romney and getting John McCain nominated.

Thomas Sowell on Newt's argument that it would not be "humane" to deport someone who has been living and working here for years:

Let's go back to square one. The purpose of American immigration laws and policies is not to be either humane or inhumane to illegal immigrants. The purpose of immigration laws and policies is to serve the national interest of this country. There is no inherent right to come live in the United States, in disregard of whether the American people want you here. Nor does the passage of time confer any such right retroactively.

Frankly, Newt's point is the same as Perry's famous statement that if you oppose in-state tuition for illegal immigrants, you have no heart. That utterance took all the wind out of Perry's sails, but conservatives now seem ready to forgive Newt everything, to avoid having Mitt Romney as their candidate. The only thing that explains the double standard on "flip-floppers" is that the true objection to Romney is his religion. Other candidates, including Newt, have changed their positions over the years. Newt famously appeared in an ad with Nancy Pelosi agreeing that global warming was a serious danger that should be a priority, which he now says was mistaken. The truth about illegal immigration is that we shouldn't even talk about giving illegals any kind of pass until we have installed a working immigration system, including secure borders, a positive identification system and strict enforcement among employers. Any talk about amnesty or anything like it is premature, because it will only encourage more people to come illegally. Fix the system first.

From the Washington Examiner: Conservatives should think twice about Newt Gingrich As the arguments against him rise, will he be able to hold his lead into the primaries? Will conservatives come to their senses? I'm beginning not to care. They've made it abundantly clear that they don't want a Mormon candidate, even if he is highly qualified.

Niall Ferguson makes an argument from history against the populist movements picking candidates.

I haven't posted what I'm thankful for this weekend, mostly because they're pretty much the same as everybody else, faith, life, family and friends, but I was just thinking of how I reread The Lord of the Rings earlier this year and having just finished Harry Potter and the Half-blood Prince and started Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. What makes them both great and popular is the same thing that caught all our imaginations in the stories of Luke Skywalker. Call it the power of myth, if you will, but to me it's the eternal verity that good and evil exist and that even the small and weak who stand by truth and right, however they may slip and go astray from time to time, can make a difference. Every one of my pioneer ancestors who crossed the plains and settled the Utah desert made a difference, both by helping lay the foundation of the society in which I grew up, but in bearing witness through their efforts and sacrifices that their faith was the greatest treasure they had on earth. The knowledge of what is right, even though the world tells us different, is a precious gift. I have received that knowledge, though my weaknesses are many, I know that God lives, that Jesus is the savior of mankind and that they communicate even now with man through the Holy Ghost, the third member of the Godhead. That knowledge is worth my life, and I thank God for it.

Victor Davis Hanson: In these racy times, Mormonism is viewed as more a guarantee of a candidate’s past probity than a political liability.

At any other time, an informed technocrat like Romney would seem a dream candidate. Yet in the run-up to this election, Americans are completely turned off by Washington’s so-called experts, such as Energy Secretary Steven Chu, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, Attorney General Eric Holder — and, increasingly, Barack Obama himself.. . . Although conservatives dub Romney a flip-flopper for changing positions on abortion, gun control, and health care, the base knew all about those old reversals in 2008, when it nonetheless praised Romney as the only conservative alternative to maverick moderate John McCain. Apparently the party has moved to the right since then. Tea partiers worry that, once in office, a moderate President Romney would prove a reach-out centrist — spending borrowed money like George W. Bush did on No Child Left Behind or the Medicare prescription-drug benefit, thereby ruining for good the now-suspect Republican brand of fiscal sobriety.

Then there's this zinger about Newt:

By now, former speaker of the House Newt Gingrich knows almost everything about everything. But lots of Newt’s original — and now abandoned — positions were as liberal as Romney’s. And not all that long ago, he seemed as brilliant and glib — and recklessly self-destructive — as his contemporary and antagonist Bill Clinton.

May God save us from ourselves. We probably don't deserve it, but there is still some good the country can do in the world.

Mormonism: Not a cult, not a problem-- Evangelicals should cast aside old suspicions and hostilities and listen carefully during this campaign. So writes Richard J. Mouw, president of Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena. Mormons have shown themselves to be loyal Americans and their religion teaches and builds strong character.