Many speakers blamed the media, "ethnic special-interest lobbies" and liberals, among others, for the modest attendance.

"At least we didn't accuse you of drowning those little children in South Carolina," Gore shot back, in reference to Gingrich's comments blaming liberals for the Susan Smith case.

A Democrat blaming liberals for voting Republican: That's modern Massachusetts.

Discussing the 60's-bashing during Newt Gingrich's heyday, the authors write: "It was part of the right-wing vogue of the day to blame liberals for poverty.

Fundamentalists blamed liberals of any hue, secularist or Christian, for the marginal status of the "true" Christians.

"People are blaming liberals for all sort of things," said Ilya Kochezrin, a 33-year-old economic consultant who lives in Moscow but who regularly travels across the country.

He is particularly evocative on the issue of ideological inconsistency, blaming liberals for demanding civil liberties but not deregulation and conservatives for wanting deregulation of markets but encouraging wiretapping.

And for all his confessions, Gingrich still retreats repeatedly to the age-old technique of blaming "liberals in the press" for his predicament.

Gingrich blamed liberals for sensational murders and called the Clintons the enemies of "normal Americans."

Another Republican, Senator Alfonse M. D'Amato, said he would begin a three-week television campaign today that would blame liberals for hurting the public school system.