Today, Mitt Romney organized an attackapalooza on Newt Gingrich with great assistance from the republican establishment and their servants in the new media. How extensive was the attack? Well, the Drudge Report ran a linkapalooza of anti-Newt attacks, which the New York Times even pointed out were gross distortions (left-click the image to enlarge it to see the 12 links and 2 images against Newt).

Many others joined in, as noted by Politico: Elliott Abrams at the National Review accused the Newt Gingrich of repeatedly attacking President Ronald Reagan. Emmett Tyrrell, Jr. wrote an article in the American Spectator, which linked Newt Gingrich’s infidelity to Bill Clinton and called them both 60s narcissists (For the record, Newt had an affair over a decade ago while separated and married the woman, while Clinton was a serial adulterer). They even brought out old 1996 loser, Bob Dole, to attack Newt (that might actually help him). A piece was written by the editors of National Review called “The Hour of Newt” (Is William F. Buckley turning in his grave yet?). Ann Coulter, who has become a regular Mitt Romney cheerleader, penned her obligatory attack piece entitled “Re-elect Obama, Vote Newt!” (How original?). FInally, they dragged out Tom Delay to declare “[Newt]’s not really a conservative.” (an obvious lie).

Considering the volume of attacks directed at Newt, it seems reasonable to assume that Mitt has been doling out the cash. The anti-Reagan line of attack, in particular, seemed directly coordinated with the ads that Mitt Romney has been running against Newt in Florida (see the video below). Ironically, Michael Reagan himself came out today in defense of Newt, and Newt’s campaign dug up a video of Nancy Reagan commenting that Reagan was passing the torch to Newt. This was bound to backfire on Romney.

The National Journal has more information on these attacks and some of the history of Gingrich and the other parties involved.

In 1994, Republicans took control of the House of Representatives for the first time in forty years. In that midterm election, Republicans, with Newt Gingrich as their leader, won an overwhelming victory, which gave them control of Congress. The primary reason for their victory was the specific set of goals that Newt Gingrich outlined out in the Contract With America. That document became the Republicans’ mandate to govern. Read over the points of Newt Gingrich’s Contract With America below (details here).

This was the agenda for the first day of the new republican Congress:

• FIRST, require all laws that apply to the rest of the country also apply equally to the Congress;
• SECOND, select a major, independent auditing firm to conduct a comprehensive audit of Congress for waste, fraud or abuse;
• THIRD, cut the number of House committees, and cut committee staff by one-third;
• FOURTH, limit the terms of all committee chairs;
• FIFTH, ban the casting of proxy votes in committee;
• SIXTH, require committee meetings to be open to the public;
• SEVENTH, require a three-fifths majority vote to pass a tax increase;
• EIGHTH, guarantee an honest accounting of our Federal Budget by implementing zero base-line budgeting.

This was the agenda for the first 100 days of the new republican Congress:

1. THE FISCAL RESPONSIBILITY ACT: A balanced budget/tax limitation amendment and a legislative line-item veto to restore fiscal responsibility to an out- of-control Congress, requiring them to live under the same budget constraints as families and businesses.

2. THE TAKING BACK OUR STREETS ACT: An anti-crime package including stronger truth-in- sentencing, “good faith” exclusionary rule exemptions, effective death penalty provisions, and cuts in social spending from this summer’s “crime” bill to fund prison construction and additional law enforcement to keep people secure in their neighborhoods and kids safe in their schools.

3. THE PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY ACT: Discourage illegitimacy and teen pregnancy by prohibiting welfare to minor mothers and denying increased AFDC for additional children while on welfare, cut spending for welfare programs, and enact a tough two-years-and-out provision with work requirements to promote individual responsibility.

4. THE FAMILY REINFORCEMENT ACT: Child support enforcement, tax incentives for adoption, strengthening rights of parents in their children’s education, stronger child pornography laws, and an elderly dependent care tax credit to reinforce the central role of families in American society.

5. THE AMERICAN DREAM RESTORATION ACT: A S500 per child tax credit, begin repeal of the marriage tax penalty, and creation of American Dream Savings Accounts to provide middle class tax relief.

6. THE NATIONAL SECURITY RESTORATION ACT: No U.S. troops under U.N. command and restoration of the essential parts of our national security funding to strengthen our national defense and maintain our credibility around the world.

7. THE SENIOR CITIZENS FAIRNESS ACT: Raise the Social Security earnings limit which currently forces seniors out of the work force, repeal the 1993 tax hikes on Social Security benefits and provide tax incentives for private long-term care insurance to let Older Americans keep more of what they have earned over the years.

8. THE JOB CREATION AND WAGE ENHANCEMENT ACT: Small business incentives, capital gains cut and indexation, neutral cost recovery, risk assessment/cost-benefit analysis, strengthening the Regulatory Flexibility Act and unfunded mandate reform to create jobs and raise worker wage.

9. THE COMMON SENSE LEGAL REFORM ACT: “Loser pays” laws, reasonable limits on punitive damages and reform of product liability laws to stem the endless tide of litigation.

10. THE CITIZEN LEGISLATURE ACT: A first-ever vote on term limits to replace career politicians with citizen legislators.

As I mentioned before, Mitt Romney’s company, Bain Capital, finished purchasing Clear Channel in 2008, a few months after Mitt Romney dropped out of the 2008 presidential race. Clear Channel owns all of the radio stations that play talk radio, and talk radio hosts have been actively attacking every conservative who rises to challenge Mitt Romney for the republican nomination. So, I thought I would give an in-depth analysis of how Rush Limbaugh is supporting Mitt Romney, since he is the biggest name in talk radio and much of the conservative media follows his lead.

Early in the race, Rush Limbaugh seemed to be looking for a conservative candidate. He stated what the Romney strategy was: keep all of the conservatives in the race and try to divide the conservative vote. However, as Newt Gingrich’s support rose above 40% and well above where any other candidate had been, it seemed the conservative vote was coalescing behind a conservative challenger. Worse still for Mitt Romney, it was happening as the elections were finally approaching. What could be done?

Suddenly, Rush Limbaugh “discovered” that Newt Gingrich was a “liberal.” Rush even suggested that Romney should run to the right of Newt. All of this was said, despite the fact that Newt had been speaking nothing but pure conservativism in the 2012 race.

What Rush did next was even more telling. He employed the the Mitt Romney strategy that he had previously explained: split the conservative vote. While bemoaning Newt’s supposed liberalism, he recited the names “Santorum,” “Bachmann,” and “Perry.” I could hardly believe it at the time. Here was Rush Limbaugh throwing out every name to split the conservatives as widely as possible, just as he had explained.

Then came the Iowa caucus. Mitt Romney and Ron Paul blew millions of dollars trashing Gingrich. With the help of talk radio, they succeeded in crushing Newt Gingrich’s poll numbers. He fell from being solidly in first place to fourth place in Iowa. Rick Santorum rose as a result and landed in an effective tie for first with Mitt Romney in the Iowa causcus. Rick Perry continued to languish near last place with about five percent.

Newt Gingrich had tried to run a strictly positive campaign, but the negative ads had hurt him severely. Rush Limbaugh gleefully reported that “negative ads work.” Gingrich decided to fight back. Super Pacs supporting Gingrich began running ads about how Mitt Romney liquidated companies and destroyed jobs while working as the CEO at Bain Capital. Suddenly, Rush Limbaugh and the conservative media began assaulting Gingrich’s ad campaign as an attack on capitalism. They compared Gingrich to Obama and defended their radio station owners, Bain Capital, viciously.

Meanwhile, with Rick Perry having lost all of his support, Rush Limbaugh suddenly took up his cause. Rush went on about how he was being unfairly perceived as being stupid because of his debate performances. Rush told us about how he had met Rick Perry and how he knew that he was intelligent. It seemed strange to spend so much time on a guy who had no hope of coming back, except that Rush was hoping to keep or grow his support for the purpose of spliting the conservative vote.

Speaking of debate performances and appearing stupid, Rush continued another theme that he started when Newt first rose in the polls. He said that Republicans were in danger of trying to elect a guy who sounded intelligent in the debates because they were afraid of appearing stupid. He went on to tell us how debates don’t matter in the election. More recently, he said that Obama will probably only agree to do two debates anyway because he doesn’t want to be challenged on his record. All of the these things were said to neutralize the impact Newt’s overwhelming debate advantage.

Then came New Hampshire, which Romney won handily–as would be expected in a northeastern, liberal state. The media began to say that Romney’s win in the first two states was historic and that the race was now over. Bachmann had already ended her campaign in Iowa, and others were looking at possibly getting out. Rush Limbaugh confindently and repeatedly pointed out that the race wasn’t over. He said that the front-runner, Mitt Romney, had only secured 12 of the 1144 delegates need to win.

Rush seemed to be encouraging the conservatives to rally, but was he? No, if Rick Perry and Rick Santorum got out the race, the conservatives would get behind Newt and push him into victory. They needed to stay in to continue splitting the vote. To emphasize the point, Jon Huntsman dropped out before the vote in South Carolina and endorsed Mitt because, as his campaign put it, he would only take votes away from Mitt by staying in the race.

Then came Monday’s debate on January 16, 2012 in South Carolina. Newt’s debate level rose from superb to divine. He received the first standing ovation since Ronald Reagan’s New Hampshire debate in the 80s. Newt was on fire and the crowd was electric.

The next day, Rush Limbaugh played Newt clips during most of his radio show; Newt had so inspired conservatives that Rush couldn’t help it. There was just one catch. Although he praised Newt’s performance, he continued to make backhanded remarks about Newt and the “liberal half of his brain” (even though there were no liberal remarks made by Newt during the debate whatsoever). Most astonishingly, he repeatedly asked whether it was too late for Newt.

Wait a minute Rush, weren’t you just telling us that it wasn’t over and that Romney only had 12 delegates. I guess it’s only over for the second place guy. The rest of the conservatives who are down further in the polls could come back at any time, right?

Today, two days after that debate in South Carolina. Rush has taken up the Romney cause in full force. He played Romney’s latest attack ad, which has one of the House members who served with Gingrich calling him unstable. Then he took a call from a Romney supporter and let him rattle off a bunch of negative talking points about Newt.

That call was followed up by a caller who said that Romney hasn’t “whined” about being attacked. Rush agreed and followed that up by making the opposite implication about Newt. In reality, Mitt Romney has whined about being attacked in the Bain Capital ads. He even whined about them in the debates. The whining about the Bain Capital ads didn’t end with Mitt, either. His company, Bain Capital, used the talk show hosts that they own to whine for him too.

This is a dark day for conservativism, and it is sad to see how talk radio has sold out to Mitt Romney. So many times, Rush has spoken about how he wished that we had candidate who could articulate conservativism. Now we do, and he’s doing everything he can to keep him out of office.

Conservative talk radio, and Rush Limbaugh in particular, rose out of the wilderness through honesty and conservative idealism. Rush has withstood countless assaults by the left because he has always spoken his mind truthfully. Nothing can destroy a source of truth, except itself. Sadly, it looks like Rush Limbaugh will now do to himself what a vast liberal army, his drug addiction, and his hearing loss could not: end his career.

Last night in South Carolina, Newt Gingrich’s stirring words invigorated the conservative movement and showed why he is the leader for our time. After Newt’s work in 1980 and 1994 to create the first two conservative revolutions, Newt is back and ready to take over the executive branch and pull us out of the greatest crisis of our lifetime. Newt’s return to politics appears divinely inspired, and last night he brought conservatives in South Carolina to their feet. For years to come, Newt Gingrich’s words on January 16, 2012 will live on in the hearts of conservatives.

It really doesn’t get anymore difficult than that. If you want smaller government, Newt is the only person in my lifetime who has been able to deliver it. Rush Limbaugh is right once again.

There are a few legitimate conservative candidates in the 2012 republican presidential race: Rick Santorum, Rick Perry, and Newt Gingrich. You could throw Ron Paul in there too, and several others like Michele Bachmann and Herman Cain, who are now out of the race. However, the only candidate to successfully shrink government is Newt, and that’s what really matters.