And now, here is the text, from here:

February 20, 2014

The Honorable John McCain
241 Russell Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510

The Honorable Newt Gingrich
Gingrich Productions
4501 North Fairfax Drive
Suite 900
Arlington, VA 22203

Dear Senator McCain and Mr. Gingrich:

Over the weekend, Secretary of State John Kerry gave a powerful and important speech in Indonesia about the dangers of climate change. Secretary Kerry accurately said, “When I think about the array of global threats … terrorism, epidemics, poverty, the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction … the reality is that climate change ranks right up there with every single one of them.”

Your reaction was disappointing. Senator McCain asked, “On what planet does he reside?” Mr. Gingrich called the Secretary “delusional” and “dangerous to our safety.”

You should know that Secretary Kerry’s assessment of the risks we face is consistent with those of national security experts of unimpeachable credentials. For example:

• Admiral Samuel J. Locklear III, Chief of U.S. military forces in the Pacific region, said that the biggest long-term security threat in the region is climate change because it “is probably the most likely thing that is going to happen . . . that will cripple the security environment, probably more likely than the other scenarios we all often talk about.”

• General Anthony Zinni, the former Commander-in-Chief of U.S. Central Command, warned, “You may also have a population that is traumatized by an event or a change in conditions triggered by climate change. … [T]hen you can be faced with a collapsing state. And these end up as breeding grounds for instability, for insurgencies, for warlords. You start to see extremism. These places act like Petri dishes for extremism and for terrorist networks.”

• Robert Gates, the former Defense Secretary, said, “over the next 20 years and more certain pressures – population, resource, energy, climate, economic, and environmental – could combine with rapid cultural, social, and technological change to produce new sources of deprivation, rage, and instability. … I believe the most persistent and dangerous threats will come less from ambitious states than failing ones that cannot meet the basic needs – much less aspirations – of their people.”

• Admiral Michael Mullen, the former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, stated, “The scarcity of an potential competition for resources like water, food and space, compounded by the influx of refugees if coastal lands are lost, does not only create a humanitarian crisis but it creates conditions of hopelessness that could lead to failed states and make populations vulnerable to radicalization.”

• Admiral John Nathan, former Commander of the U.S. Fleet Forces, predicted, “There are serious risks to doing nothing about climate change. We can pay now or we’re going to pay more later.”

• James Clapper, the Director of the National Intelligence, testified, “there will almost assuredly be security concerns with respect to … energy and climate change. Environmental stresses are not just humanitarian issues. They legitimately threaten regional stability.”

• Thomas Fingar, the former Chairman of the National Intelligence Council, concluded, “We judge global climate change will have wide-ranging implications for US national security interests.”

• Hans Blix, the former chief UN weapons inspector, said he thought climate change posed a greater threat to the planet than nuclear proliferation.

You may also want to review the 2010 Quadrennial Defense Review, which called climate change “an accelerant of instability or conflict” that “could have significant geopolitical impacts around the world, contributing to poverty, environmental degradation, and the further weakening of fragile governments.”

These concerns about the profound risks of climate change are shared by distinguished world leaders. Last month, Kofi Annan, the former Secretary General of the United Nations, wrote in the Washington Post, “Climate change is the biggest challenge of our time. It threatens the well-being of hundreds of millions of people today and many billions more in the future.” Christine Lagarde, Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund, said last year that climate change has the “potential for major social and economic disruption.” And Dr. Jim Yong Kim, President of the World Bank Group, stated that if we fail to confront climate change “we could witness the rolling back of decades of development gains and force tens of millions more to live in poverty.”

You may also want to reflect on what Robert Rubin, the widely respected former Treasury Secretary, said just last month about climate change: “There are a lot of really significant, monumental issues facing the global economy, but this supersedes them all.”

Senator McCain made a particular point of criticizing Secretary Kerry for talking about climate change “when we have got 130,000 people in Syria killed.” This is an inaccurate criticism because Secretary Kerry has been devoting extensive attention to Syria. It is also uninformed. There are experts who believe that climate change and the extended drought is one of the underlying causes of the conflicts in Syria. As the New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman wrote, tensions in the Middle East have been “driven not only by political and economic stresses, but, less visibly, by environmental, population and climate stresses as well. If we focus only on the former and not the latter, we will never be able to help stabilize these societies.”

Secretary Kerry needs allies in this fight for the future of our planet. History will not look back and fault him for leading the charge to prevent the worst impacts of climate change while we still have time. But history may question why Republican leaders who were once their party’s champions on climate change fled the field at a crucial moment.

Sincerely,

Rep. Henry A. Waxman

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse

And finally, here is the link to the PDF file.

However, in comparing all of the candidates in polls asking people across the country which Republican they would vote for, Romney is NOT a clear winner. In fact, Gingrich tends to score a couple of points ahead of Romney. In one recent poll (NBC/Wall Street Journal) Gingrich was 9 points ahead. In the most recent poll (Gallup Tracking) Gingrich was just 2 points ahead.

But the preference for Gingrich does not align with national polls comparing the various republican candidates with Obama. In these polls, Romney tends to come closer to Obama’s lead than does Gingrich, who tends to get his ass whupped by the President, with Barack Obama showing a double-digit lead over the hapless and blithering ex-speaker.

But a lot can change in two days. Gingrich is on the attack against Romney, and his main point of attack seems to be to point out how Romney is on the attack against Gingrich. I don’t expect this to change the outcome of the Florida Primary. Romney will win there, although is it always possible that he will win by less than the current polls suggest. But what may happen over the longer term is a shift in the overall view of Gingrich and Romney by Republican voters in general. I expect there to be a downgrading of support for both “Front Runners” as they continue to slam each other. Santorum will come out a minor winner over the medium term, possibly even taking a state or two if his strategy is managed effectively and his money holds out.

Just for fun here’s Ron Paul’s attack ad ad d d attack attack ack ack ad d against Gingrich:

And here’s a video about Mitt Romney (this one’s been around a while):

And in Otter Matters:

Polling data from RealClearPolitics.

OK, that’s all funny and everything, but I’m very disappointed in both the producers of this piece and in some of the attitudes associated with it.

First, where the hell is Michele Bachmann? Michele produces a “Greatest Moment” every time she opens her mouth! Has Bachmann’s ever flowing river of crazy become the new normal, so that it isn’t even noticed by political satirists anymore? That, my friends, is exactly what I warned about when she first started running. Well, I said that mainly in my own head, but I’m sure you figured it out too. Bedtime for Bonzo isn’t just a think you say when it is bed time. Its a movie starring the man considered by the majority of Americans to be the greatest president who ever existed in the United States of America.

The second thing that is somewhat disappointing is, of course, the polarization. The woman commenting on Gingrich’s child labor remark expressed my feelings exactly. Gingrich’s suggestion to enslave the poor children of the inner cities to clean toilets is a bad idea, but one that can be transformed into a good one. A youth jobs program is a great idea. They used to be more common, and have often been part economic stimulus. But not like Gingrich says. More like the lady in the video says.

And finally, since Michele Bachmann was left out of this video, here’s a makeup video, with Sarah Palin:

I love the Boston Accent on Paul.

Any single one of these stooges running for the republicans, including and maybe especially, New Gingrich, could be the next president of the United States if a) enough liberal stay home and b) enough liberals and progressives vote for a third party or do some other stupid thing, ensuring that Obama is not re-elected.

Gingrich has stated that he would use the Federal Marshall Service to arrest judges who make decisions that he does not agree with. Consider the following interview:

SCHIEFFER: One of the things you say is that if you don’t like what a court has done, that Congress should subpoena the judge and bring him before Congress and hold a Congressional hearing… how would you enforce that? Would you send the Capitol Police down to arrest him?

GINGRICH: Sure. If you had to. Or you’d instruct the Justice Department to send a U.S. Marshal.

From Think Progress.

So, get all passive aggressive at Obama, maybe you get Gingrich.

The report alleges an extra-marital bout or possibly multiple bouts of oral sex, which, the accuser notes, was Gingrich’s preferred activity so he could later say that he “had not slept with” whomever. Seems to me you could just have sex and not go to sleep and say that but whatever.

An, yes, I checked. Gingrich was in the House in 1988, when the republicans started their “Nuclear Strategy” which they have continued to use since then, initiating the new approach to Ruining America at very opportunity by impeaching the President of the United States for what was by all accounts a poorly executed … well, let’s just say, it all depends on what is is. Right, Newt?

I’ve always wondered, ever since Gingrich’s “Contract On America” why he hated his own people so much. Now, I ask, why does he hate the Palestinians, and by extent ion, the Israelis, and for that matter, modern Russians who did not exist just a few decades ago? And himself? He does, after all, reinvent himself every four years or so.

Those who can’t teach run for office, I guess.

My source is here.