This bit of news, reported by Politico, is so agonizingly ridiculous that to even bring it up seems like it will first require dismembering it into all its constituent asininities. It simply will not fit through the news door otherwise.

At its heart, the “news” is that Incompetent Narcissist Criminal Guy—also known as Dear Leader, also known as Donald Trump, also known as the man who proved all of Republicanism to be a hollow shell propped up at this point only by racism and a willingness to commit petty crimes—wants to craft a new “policy agenda” for the Republican Party. To roughly quote Diogenes, I shitteth y’all not.

Donald Trump is sitting in Mar-a-Lago stewing in his own bile, and he has allegedly gotten it into his head that what Republicanism needs right now is a “policy agenda” that nobody in his party could come up before, that he was unable to elucidate during four years of half-assing his way through government, and that turned into an albatross hung ‘round the neck of any Republican who dared attempt it after Trump invalidated, reversed, double-reversed, or just ignored every deep policy belief the party ever claimed to have.

Recall, for example, that the Republican Party refused to even have an official party platform during their 2020 convention, instead going with a catch-all declaration that whatever Trump was for, they were for, whatever that happened to be on any particular day.

The news that Donald Trump is allegedly now of the belief that Republicans need a “doctrine” is bullshittery at the highest level. The next bit of the story makes it even more ridiculous.

Who is allegedly spearheading this new policy think-upping? Newt Gingrich!

No, really. Newt Gingrich. You know, the disgraced ex-House Republican leader (not the pedophile, the other one) who wrecked governance the first time around and has devoted his current would-be comeback to kissing Trump’s ample behind in as many individual television appearances as the gods will grant him. He seems thoroughly obsessed with joining the ranks of such Trump-promoted titans of Republicanism as Rudy Giuliani, Paul Manafort, the two Fox lawyers who got raided by the FBI, Michael Cohen, Michael Flynn, Jeff Sessions, and takeyourpick.

Trump “sat down” with Newt “in recent weeks,” Politico informs us, to work out a new “Contract with America”—

Stop laughing, damnit, we’re going to get through this together.

—based on “MAGA” principles. He is assisted by Sen. Lindsey Graham, former chief of staff and unindicted co-conspirator Mark Meadows, and presumably whichever Mar-a-Lago guests spring for the Salmon and Deciding Policy Lunch Special on those particular days.

Newt Gingrich is meeting with Donald Trump to craft a new Contract with America based on new Republicanism’s principles. That is a baffling sentence, isn’t it? It’s like it was written on a dare.

“The group is still just beginning to hammer out the details—” yeah, no kidding. The document, “if one is issued at all,” is not expected to be ready “anytime soon.” Politico’s source on this one is anonymous, but coincidentally Newt is willing to pipe up to describe what he believes the document should look like.

“‘It should be positive,’ Gingrich said. ‘School choice, teaching American history for real, abolishing the ‘1619 Project,’ eliminating critical race theory and what the Texas legislature is doing. We should say, ‘Bring it on.’”

All right then, so it will be a “positive” document underlining white nationalist mythologies as central theme, with a direct focus on weakening public schools and tightly restricting what can be taught about our history. That’s the only part of the story that sounds plausible. No need to meddle with infrastructure priorities, tax policy, or the rest; the new Republican Contract with America will focus on what New Republicanism can agree on, and what New Republicanism can agree on is hard racism and unrelenting propaganda. Hitler has found a willing editor for his manifesto, and things are looking up for the failed German painter.

Combing through this story to piece together what’s actually going on here, I have a working theory. Putting together the “source familiar” with the Newt-Donald meetings, the willingness of Newt himself to talk, the oddly distanced account of what Trump himself thinks of any of this, and the general premise on which Newt Gingrich—who was run out of politics for his conduct until at long last the rest of his party degraded so far that his own scandals now seem Paleozoic—is a new party savior working with Indifferent Self-Obsessed Narcissist to return Republicanism to a time of havin’ policies and theoretically standing for things, here’s the most likely “news” to be had here:

Newt Gingrich broke into Mar-a-Lago or had someone spring for him to attend as a guest, and began ingratiating himself to Trump with promises of a new Trumpian era of policies and important-looking slides that would just by-the-way allow Trump to claim some relevance despite spending the entirety of his post-presidential life hiding inside his for-profit house and airing an assortment of grievances to wedding guests. I can be your new Rudy Giuliani, Newt says, since Old Rudy Giuliani looks like he’ll be going to prison just like the last guys did.

This isn’t a story about Donald Trump wanting to suddenly write down policies he never gave a damn about writing down before. This is a story about Newt Gingrich crawling through Mar-a-Lago ductwork, dropping down on Donald’s table during a random gloomy lunch, and promising the deposed god-king that with the scrubbing bubbles of Newt Gingrich’s policy chops, he can yet again force the party into doing whatever he says. Or, technically, he can force them into doing whatever Gingrich says he says, without having to worry about the details himself. Just as long as it’s racist, he doesn’t care.

Well, it is something that we’ll have to keep an eye on. The odds that Donald Trump will retain interest long enough to even give Newt something to work with are low, but the real news is that Gingrich is so eager to rejoin Republicanism’s new fascist movement that he’s willing to take on a position of confidante that has left a large percentage of past position holders either indicted or disgraced. Newt’s already disgraced, so there’s not much risk there, but given the history here we can productively assume that this ends with a new Newt indictment for … something. God knows what, though. Has he spent any time in Russia lately?