Will GOP Red Meat Soundbite Guru Hook up With Newt Gingrich?

Over the years, Luntz, the Republican Party pollster and political strategist has had a longtime relationship with Newt Gingrich. As the campaign unwinds, will Luntz return to the side of the disgraced former Speaker?

On a recent appearance on Sean Hannity's radio program, Frank Luntz told the radio talk show host's audience that he was surprised how quickly Newt Gingrich had risen in Republican Party polls over the past few weeks. He pointed out that the former Speaker of the House has an "intellect" and a "vision" and knows how to "change things." Luntz added: "It is almost as if he is the ultimate anti-Obama candidate. Obama is about words, and Gingrich is about ideas."

It is more than interesting that the man who for nearly two decades has helped poison the political debate, consistently using words to deflect and destroy ideas, would make that statement.

After nearly two decades of producing books - most notably, Words that Work: It's Not What You Say it's What People Hear -- and dozens of strategic memos for the GOP, organizing who knows how many focus groups, making countless appearances on Fox News, being named by Time magazine as one of "50 of America's most promising leaders aged 40 and under" (he's older than that now) and named one of the four "Top Research Minds" by Business Week, does Frank Luntz have anything new to say?

Probably not, but in today's mashed up political landscape, that might not really matter.

Luntz's services are a highly sought after commodity. The dance card of the Republican Party pollster, political consultant, pundit, focus group moderator, author, and head of Luntz Global is almost always completely full. Amongst the company's corporate clients have been the Motion Picture Association of America, the National Association of Broadcasters, the Recording Industry Association, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. He's advised the Prime Minister of Canada, is a favorite of a number of right-wing Israeli politicians, and a multitude of GOP officials.

On Saturday, November 19, Luntz moderated a Republican Party presidential forum in Iowa focused on how the candidates' religious faith informed their public life.

Earlier in the month, Luntz organized "a private focus group on behalf of gambling interests looking to make inroads into Florida, the Sunshine State News reported.

Luntz is no Forrest Gump; he is more than just present at interesting points in time/history. That Luntz can move seamlessly from a Christian conservative sponsored on religious faith in public life to a private focus group paid for by gambling interests isn't not all that surprising. For Luntz, it's all about the politics, the prestige, and the money.

Thanksgiving Family Forum

Six GOP presidential hopefuls (sans Romney and Huntsman) take part in the Iowa Thanksgiving Family Forum, hosted by The Family Leader, a conservative Christian outfit whose members' religious views dominates their political decision masking. The forum is co-sponsored by Citizen Link (an affiliate of Focus on the Family) and the National Organization for Marriage. The AP later reported that, "some of the discussion turned uncharacteristically personal, with the would-be presidents tearfully revealing formative chapters that shaped their faith."

In a 2010 Jerusalem Post interview Frank Luntz is described as "The tubby Jewish kid" and "communications king." Here, as in most of his paid gigs, he is Luntz the ringmaster.

He is introduced as Dr. Frank Luntz. He starts off with an icebreaker; an attempt at humor -- he is still waiting for his invitation to a gala birthday party for an important Iowa politician, happening later that evening. It falls flat, but not in an embarrassing way. It just wasn't all that funny.

It's time to get to the business at hand. He tells the crowd of 3,000-plus in the pews of the First Federated Church in Des Moines that he is "nervous." He says that, "this is for me probably the most important day in my life because I want it to be one of the most significant days in your life." Note the word "probably"; it almost defines the man.

Luntz asks if there are any Occupy Wall Street protesters in the room: "If you've come here to protest, take two minutes now and speak to everyone here about what's on your mind....so there isn't a disruption in the next two hours." One man steps forward and rambles for a bit about the Federal Reserve Bank.

The candidates take their places at a roundish-type table. Luntz is sitting next to Newt Gingrich.

Some highlights: The disgraced former House Speaker talks about his unfaithfulness and two divorces, and launches a bomb at the Occupy movement. The Chicago Reader would report: "Asked to discuss freedom and responsibility, Gingrich used his time to spank the Occupy movement. The protesters 'take over a public park they didn't pay for,' the former House speaker said, 'go nearby to use bathrooms they didn't pay for, beg for food...they don't want to pay for, obstruct those who are going to work to pay the taxes to sustain the bathrooms, and to sustain the park, so they can self-righteously explain that they are the paragons of virtue, to which we owe everything. Now, that is a pretty good symptom of how much the left has collapsed as a moral system in this country, and why you need to reassert something as simple as saying to them, 'Go get a job, right after you take a bath.'"

Herman Cain acknowledges that he didn't spend enough time at home with his family during "his career's meteoric rise to the top of a national restaurant chain"; Rick Santorum "tearfully confesse[s] to have resisted loving his severely disabled daughter"; Michelle Bachmann "describe[s] the pain and uncertainty of her parents' divorce" when she was an adolescent girl, but held back somewhat when asked what prompted her Christian awakening when she was 16. Fellow Texans, Ron Paul and Rick Perry, are a bit more circumspect about their personal lives. Perry talks about "the moment he turned to his Christian faith."

Luntz says he feels "like Dr. Phil." He observes that the candidates "have more that you agree on than those small things you disagree on."

The forum ends; Luntz moves on. I don't know if he ever made it to the birthday party.

Pro-gambling Florida focus group

A week earlier, Luntz organizes a focus group that is less about religion and heart felt personal confessions, and totally about how to win public support for building a grand gambling palace in Florida.

"Up to 35 local residents participated in the exercise, which one participant described as a promotion for the project," Sunshine State News points out. ?"'All speeches were pro-gambling,' said a Miami resident who spoke on condition of anonymity. 'At one point, we were asked how we felt about a foreign investor.' The audience was also about Miami becoming the 'New Singapore, as if that were a good thing,' the participant related."

According to Sunshine State News, "A spokeswoman for the Malaysia-based Genting Group said the Luntz session was paid for by Associated Industries of Florida, a strong supporter of the casino legislation."

According to The Buzz, a blog on Florida Politics from the staff of the St. Petersburg Times, Associated Industries of Florida, a business lobbying group that has received donations from the casino industry, "has made it a top legislative priority to pass legislation to bring destination resort casinos to Florida."

A AIF press release stated that the group "plans to aggressively lobby for legislation that will allow up to three destination resorts in South Florida, create up to 100,000 jobs for Floridians and bring billions in revenue to the state,'' the group said in a press release issued today."

At the focus group conducted by Luntz, the bill's sponsors, Sen. Ellyn Bogdanoff and Rep. Erik Fresen, spoke.

One focus group member "came away with the impression that Luntz's program was conducted 'for a specific casino company and that the lawmakers were there at the behest of that company.'"

The Gingrich connection

At two Luntz-organized focus groups, Gingrich has emerged as the winner of GOP debates. The conservative website NewsMax.com reported that "Gingrich won the latest Republican debate because of his consistency and ability to credibly answer questions, according to the vast majority of members of a focus group assembled by ... Luntz. This was the second debate in a row where a Luntz group backed Gingrich - the first last month in Las Vegas."

Luntz has a longtime connection to Gingrich; in 1994, Luntz helped Gingrich put together the "Contract with America," which propelled the GOP to take control of the House of Representatives. Since that time, Luntz has advised Gingrich on and off for 15 years, the New York Times reported last year. "He's more powerful than the entire Republican National Committee," Luntz said. "He has a better e-mail list, he has better ideas, he's a better communicator and he's more in touch with what people think."

The strategic memos

Although he's had a falling out with Party officials over the years, The Republican pollster-political consultant has been the master of the campaign strategic memo.

In 1997, there was Luntz's 222-page report called "The Language of the 21st Century," a work he claimed was his "most serious effort to put together an effective, comprehensive national communication strategy."

During the height of the Monica Lewinsky scandal, Luntz advised congressional Republicans to "'speak out' on the sexual allegations swirling around President Clinton," columnist David Corn reported. "It was right not to rush to judgment," Luntz advised in the four-page memo. "It was right to let the media carry the weight of investigation. It was right to give the president time to respond. But... it's time to speak out."

In 2002, in a memo focused on the environment, Luntz counseled Republicans "how to discuss environmental issues," Media Matters For Amereica reported. "This memo was particularly memorable for the advice Luntz offered on how to deal with the emerging scientific consensus that global warming is a real phenomenon with potentially dangerous consequences. Luntz advised Republicans to exploit the last 'window of opportunity' for Republicans to argue that the science of global warming is uncertain. He wrote: 'The scientific debate is closing [against us] but not yet closed. There is still a window of opportunity to challenge the science.'"

A June 2004 memo titled "Communicating The Principles Of Prevention & Protection In The War On Terror" coached Republicans on how to connect the Iraq war with the war on terror, including concepts like "It is better to fight the War on Terror on the streets of Baghdad than on the streets of New York or Washington" and "9/11 changed everything."

A 2009 memo titled "The Language of Healthcare 2009," advised Republicans on the language to use to kill President Obama's health care plan.

Last year, Luntz distributed a memo "with advice on language to use to kill financial; reform legislation before Congress,' Source Watch reported. "Luntz urged opponents of reform to say the legislation is filled with bank bailouts, lobbyist loopholes, and additional layers of complicated government bureaucracy."

On Election Day 2010, The Word Doctors (Frank Luntz) issued a lengthy memo to Matt Kibbe, President and CEO of FreedomWorks, one of the most prominent Tea Party organizations. Luntz wrote: "Let the record clearly show that the Tea Party did not contribute to the 2010 wave election. It created it."

.... "If Republicans win the margins they expect today, they won't have themselves to thank. They'll have the Tea Party to thank (and, for that matter, the Democrats too)." Luntz went on to emphasize that "The Tea Party is NOT an 'extremist segment of American politics.' The Tea Party IS America."

Luntz pointed out that "The most potent political force in America today is the Tea Party movement. It is here to stay. And just as sure as it is poised to give Republicans one more chance in 2010, it is prepared to hold the party accountable in 2012, 2014, and every other year that it fails to deliver."

ENDS

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