New Gingrich ad: America’s starting to look like Cuba

It wouldn’t be a Florida presidential primary without Cuba playing a big part in the debate, and Newt Gingrich doesn’t fail to deliver on some red meat here. In a new ad that has gone out in both English and Spanish, the ad shows one Cuban-American warning that the US is “starting to look like the country my parents fled.” The language is actually harsher in Spanish than English:

In a new Spanish-language ad, former House speaker Newt Gingrich suggests — through Cuban-American speakers — that President Obama is headed down the same path as Fidel Castro.

“My parents came to America looking for freedom and opportunity, and now America is starting to look like the country my parents fled,” says a young man in the English version of the ad.

“With things like government-run health care, and taxing businesses out of business,” a young woman continues. “But Newt Gingrich wants to rebuild the America that we love.” The man returns to say, “My family knows what it is to lose the country they love. They won’t stand by and watch it happen to this one.”

The Miami Herald translated the Spanish version, in which some of the language appears to be a little harsher — “socialized medicine” is used intead of “government-run health care.”

It’s more than a bit hyperbolic — we’re not even approaching the UK and Canada yet, let alone Cuba — but the Cuban card usually makes for good politics in Florida.  Marco Rubio certainly talks about the experiences of his family as Cuban exiles as a learning experience that guides his political philosophy, although I’m not sure that he’d go so far as to say that America’s looking a little Castroish these days.  Ted Cruz has done the same in Texas to good effect.  Both of these men have more personal connections to that comparison, but that doesn’t really make a lot of difference; no one expects Gingrich to say soy un Cubano, either.  Best of all, the ad attacks in the right direction — Barack Obama — rather than back into the GOP.  Think of this as a water’s-edge boundary, only applied to the primary race.

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