NANCY PELOSI'S INADVERTENTLY BRILLIANT PSY-OP

When I first read what Nancy Pelosi said about Newt Gingrich -- posted under the headline "Democrats Gleeful At Prospect Of Running Against Gingrich" -- I thought, "No! Don't tell them we think he's a weak candidate! Don't push them toward Romney!" And Pelosi was clearly making no secret of how she and the rest of us feel:

"I like Barney Frank's quote the best, where he said 'I never thought I'd live such a good life that I would see Newt Gingrich be the nominee of the Republican party,'" Pelosi said in an exclusive interview Friday. "That quote I think spoke for a lot of us."

Pelosi didn't go into detail about Gingrich's past transgressions, but she tipped her hand. "One of these days we'll have a conversation about Newt Gingrich," Pelosi said. "I know a lot about him. I served on the investigative committee that investigated him, four of us locked in a room in an undisclosed location for a year. A thousand pages of his stuff."

Pressed for more detail she wouldn't go further.

"Not right here," Pelosi joked. "When the time's right."

But I realize this is brilliant -- even thought it appears as if it wasn't intended to be. The focus of the story is not on Pelosi's dismissal of Gingrich as a weak candidate, but on her claim that she has dirt on Gingrich. If the folks in the crazy base hear only that, they're going to think: Ah! Evil Nancy Pelosi and the other thuggish liberals are trying to destroy Gingrich through devious, unethical means! They're doing this because THEY FEAR HIM! (Gingrich, of course, responded that Pelosi seemed to be threatening to reveal confidential congressional ethics information, and said the release of that information would itself be an ethics violation.)

ABC followed up with a story titled "Pelosi Not Sitting on Trove of Gingrich Secrets":

But this afternoon, Pelosi's spokesman, Drew Hammill, suggested that her comments have been misconstrued beyond the leader's intent.

"Leader Pelosi was clearly referring to the extensive amount of information that is in the public record, including the comprehensive committee report with which the public may not be fully aware," Hammill wrote in a statement.

In the wingnut brain this translates as: See? This was a sleazy attempt at character assassination! In fact, they have nothing on Gingrich! But they'll throw everything they can at him -- lies, innuendos -- because they fear him the most!

Remember, they say stuff like this about all kinds of losers -- they said we feared Sarah Palin; they said we feared Herman Cain. Why wouldn't they say this about Gingrich?

So this is likely to make wingers more likely to vote for him. Nice work, Nancy. But please stop telling them we think Gingrich is a joke (you too, Barney).