Posted on 11/22/2011 7:54:39 PM PST by gop_overkill
Reagan always tried to do the things he said he wanted to do. He failed to get rid of the Ed Dept., for example, but that was because, as one of his Assistant Secretaries of Education told me, the RINO’s in the House and Senate would sponsor the legislation.
Newt isn’t nearly the clear conservative thinker that Reagan was by the time he unsuccessfully ran in 1976. By 1980, Reagan had a thorough principled understanding of policy issues, was able to articulate them, and wasn’t going to compromise away his principles. I don’t think Newt would have, for example, walked out of negotiations with the Soviets at Reykjavik. Newt would probably have tried to come up with some clever dodge that would have nevertheless failed. When push comes to shove, Newt will prove an unprincipled “pragmatist”.
Agreement is always a question of degree. Newt is given to gimmicks, whether it is laptops, Six Sigma, Jack Kemp style social engineering, etc. He also is unreliable on social issues such as immigration, sodomites in the military, affirmative action, etc.
If elected he might be worse than Romney.
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