I remember watching Johnny Carson on the Tonight show years ago.  Already on the couch were three legends:  Bob Hope, John Wayne, and Dean Martin.  Comedian Lonesome George Gobel came out to do a stand-up routine.  He came over to sit by Johnny.    For those of you unfamiliar with “Lonesome George”, as he was called, George was around 60 years old, with a brush cut and a face like a basset hound.

George looked down the couch at the three legends sitting there, paused for just the right amount of time, grinned at the camera and said:

Did you ever feel like the world was a tuxedo and you were a pair of brown shoes?

Going into the Republican Primary today in Florida, Newt Gingrich must feel that way.

This past week, Gingrich was the object of an unbelievably intense attack by the Main Stream Media, any Democrat that could get close to a microphone, and, of, course, Mitt “The Legend” Romney.

And it’s continuing even as I write this blog.  According to MSNBC:

Calling himself “the legitimate heir to the Reagan movement,” Newt Gingrich recently cited a 1995 speech by Nancy Reagan in which the former First Lady said that her husband “passed on the torch” to him.

“In 1995, Nancy Reagan at the Goldwater Institute was very generous,” Gingrich told voters in Florida on Sunday. “And she said ‘Just as Barry gave the torch to Ronny, Ronny has passed on the torch to Newt.’”

But as NBC’s Andrea Mitchell reports, Gingrich appears to be taking that comment out of context.

Sources close to Nancy Reagan said the speech itself was written by the host at the Goldwater Organization – where Mrs. Reagan delivered the remarks – and that she was referring generally to Congress and not specifically to the former Speaker, Mitchell reported on her MSNBC program.

Gingrich’s claim that he was a key figure in the Reagan revolution in 1980s is “patently false,” added Al Hunt, executive editor of Bloomberg News, during an appearance on Mitchell’s show.

Hunt said that Reagan biographer Lou Cannon has contended that Gingrich had nothing to do with the “Reagan Revolution.”

“He was a backbencher. Lou’s not even sure Reagan knew who Gingrich was,” Hunt said.

Hunt painted a stark contrast between “can-do optimist” Reagan and Gingrich, whose appeal derives from being able to “attack Democrats better than anybody.”

“I think they are quite different people. And certainly at a minimum, the Speaker’s claims — or his latter-day Reaganism — are exaggerated” Hunt added.

So, what was Newt doing while this “story” broke?  He was out campaigning with MICHAEL REAGAN.

Meanwhile “The Legacy”, gracious individual that he is, was not out attacking Obama and explaining all the great things he’s going to do if he wins the Republican Nomination and, somehow, beats the incumbent. (If Obama doesn’t bring up the whole “rich guy” thing or, shudder, Romneycare.)

Nope.  He was making fun of Gingrich:

A confident Mitt Romney solidified his lead in Florida polls and ridiculed Republican rival Newt Gingrich on Monday, calling his opponent’s attacks “sad” and “painfully revealing” the day before the state’s crucial presidential primary.

Romney’s self-assuredness was on full display during a campaign tour that felt at times like a victory lap, with the front-runner telling a crowd of 2,000 in Dunedin, Florida: “With a turnout like this I got a feeling we might win tomorrow.”

Romney has a double-digit lead in most polls in the state, where he said voters responded to his more aggressive criticism over the past week of Gingrich’s work for mortgage giant Freddie Mac, his ethics probe and his resignation as U.S. House of Representatives speaker.

“There’s no question that politics ain’t bean bags, and we have made sure that our message is out loud and clear,” Romney said on NBC’s “Today” show.

Gingrich, hit hard last week by a more aggressive Romney strategy, branded his rival as a party insider and elite friend of Wall Street while pledging to stay in the presidential race for the long haul no matter what the outcome in Florida.

“On big philosophical issues, he is for all practical purposes a liberal and I am a conservative and that’s what this fight is going to be about all the way to the convention,” he said of Romney on “CBS This Morning.”

Romney shrugged off the continued Gingrich attacks, drawing cheers from the crowd when he said Gingrich was not doing too well and had been “flailing about.”

“I know, it’s sad isn’t it?” Romney said, calling it “painfully revealing” and adding: “You’ve just gotta shake your head.”

Funny.  Mitt didn’t deny he was a Liberal, did he?

There’s a reason that “The Establishment” Republicans, the Democrats, and the Main Stream Media have gone out of their way to destroy Newt Gingrich’s Reputation and political aspirations:

They will tell you whom they fear.