With all the buzz around Rep. Paul and a potential Iowa win, it’s no wonder actual GOP candidates are annoyed. Speaker Gingrich recently dismissed Rep. Paul as nothing more than a “protest candidate.” Newsmax reports:
Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul appears poised for a strong showing in next week’s Iowa caucuses, but as for his chance of ultimately winning the GOP nomination, rival Newt Gingrich confidently declares: “It won’t happen.”
“You have somebody who is for the legalization of drugs, you have somebody who blames America for 9/11, you have somebody who doesn’t think it matters if Iran gets nuclear weapons, and seems totally unwilling to defend Israel, you have somebody who came out for basically the abolition of Medicare/Medicaid and Social Security, and you have somebody who can’t defend and won’t take responsibility for his own newsletters even when they had very negative, very destructive things in them,” Gingrich says.
“Now, I think Ron Paul is terrific as a protest candidate. I mean you have to admire him. He has worked hard. I think he sincerely believes what he is saying and I think a lot of people are initially attracted to him because it sounds pure and it sounds clear but those folks haven’t looked at what he actually stands for.
“I don’t think the Republican Party — and Gary Johnson discovered this, the former governor of New Mexico — is going to nominate somebody who is for legalizing drugs. We’re not going to nominate somebody who thinks that it is okay for Iran to have nuclear weapons and we’re not going to nominate somebody who doesn’t care if Israel is wiped out.
“So I think when you really think about him as president, it’s not going to happen, which doesn’t mean in the short run that [he can’t do well] in a place like Iowa where there is a caucus. He has thousands of young people coming to help him because they want to legalize drugs. Well, that’s their prerogative. In a free society they can be for that and they’ll be formidable in a situation like Iowa.
“But in the long run, in primaries where we have lots of voters, I think the American people are going to repudiate that idea by an overwhelming margin.”
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