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I am almost beginning to feel sorry for Newt Gingrich.
Last Sunday, on "Meet the Press" he committed what Mike Kinsley has long called a "Washington gaffe" which happens not when you speak mistakenly, but when you tell a truth that happens to be politically inconvenient. Gingrich called the House-passed Ryan budget "right wing social engineering." This is the same budget that some conservatives are falsely claiming Archbishop Timothy Dolan has now endorsed.
Of course, politically, it was dumb for Gingrich to say what he said. But, what he said was the truth and he has had to spend the entire week dialing it back. Such is the contemporary state of GOP orthodoxy. But, no matter how many times Ryan and his allies say their plan is designed to save Medicare, people do not believe politicians on such issues. (Or bishops for that matter.) They believe the AARP.
