Mitt Romney is sleeping quite a bit easier tonight, and I'm sure thanking some deity for the gift of Newt Gingrich.
You know I think Gingrich is a liar and just downright smarmy (see my previous post). But I always thought he had some intelligence. I disagreed with pretty much everything he ever said, but I thought there was at least some effective gray matter in his cabeza. But now we find out Newt is crazy. I mean, like really crazy!
Bein's that the Republican clown show has now moved down to Florida, Gingrich finds this a great opportunity to pander to the space crowd down there. It turns out that space travel -- as well as occupation of the Moon -- is a favorite subject for ol' Newtie. When he said at a campaign event that he wanted an American colony on the Moon by the end of his second term (keep dreamin', Newt), I knew Newt had gone to an entirely different place. And it's not anywhere a sane person would want to go. But look! Newt has gotten himself his own robot! Oh, sorry, that's his wife. Danger, Will Robinson! By the way, the man who voiced the robot on Lost in Space died recently. RIP, buddy.
Anyway, about the Moon, Newt... see, we've already been there. More than once. And guess what? There's nothing there! Well, there's dust, and some rocks. We brought some of that back home, but discovered rocks aren't so much fun. They're just rocks, even if they are from the Moon. And you can't breathe on the Moon, either, at least not without one of those funny and uncomfortable suits. So it turns out the Moon is a big downer. Hence the reason we haven't been back.
So why does Newt think we should colonize the Moon? Well, he has several novel ideas for it, which he actually wrote about in a book called Window of Opportunity. One idea is putting big mirrors on it so we can direct more sunlight toward Earth (as if we don't have enough of a problem with global warming). Anyway, he wants these mirrors strategically placed so the light will shine down on high crime areas. Yeah. I mean, we have streetlights now, Newt, you might have heard of 'em. Anyway, one of his other ideas is to send all the "extra" farmers there (gee, and here I thought we were facing a future shortage of farmers... who knew?) There are other wacky Newt ideas for the Moon, but you get the idea.
Now, here we are, in 2012, facing $14 trillion in debt, an unemployment rate that's still almost 9%, millions of homes underwater or facing foreclosure, the possibility of having to cut Social Security and Medicare (you know, the programs that many middle-class and poor people rely on as a safety net), and Newt wants to colonize the Moon. Seriously. How did Mitt's oppo people miss this one? They could have put this guy away months ago!
Rachel Maddow had a great episode on her show about this very subject. When you get a minute, take a look at the video below, because Rachel is always entertaining, but this one is really a hoot:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26315908/vp/46157256#46157256
It is too late for Jon Huntsman to pop back into the race? I mean, I wouldn't vote for him, but at least us Americans wouldn't look like such idiots to the rest of the world if we had a halfway decent candidate on the other side. Seriously, it may be funny now, but next time I go overseas I just may have to disguise myself as a Canadian.
