(Townhall.com) Would Nominating Newt Destroy the Tea Party?

Townhall ^ | December 1st, 2011 | Guy Benson

[Halfmanhalfamazing]

An interesting and provocative thesis from Joshua Green, writing in the Boston Globe:

For two years, the driving force in national politics has been the Tea Party, whose founding myth was that ordinary citizens were rising up in defiant objection to the hidebound, self-dealing ways of Washington. Greedy politicians, this view held, had bloated the government and lined their own pockets at taxpayers’ expense, while letting the country go to rot. Prime examples were the expansion of government health care and federal support for the housing market - especially Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the government-sponsored entities that many conservatives blame for the financial crisis. The mere fact of being a veteran Washington legislator made respected conservatives like Senator Bob Bennett of Utah into Tea Party targets and cost many their jobs. Should all that anger, energy, and antipathy to Washington end up concentrating itself in the person of Newt Gingrich, then the movement will have failed in its most important race.

[Halfmanhalfamazing]

I'm suspicious of this article because he opens up by quoting something out of the boston globe. That right there is a red flag. Furthermore, he seems like a Romney supporter. I don't like Romney either. But I do wish more people would see Gingrich's record:

Newt Gingrich: The Establishment’s Conservative(From 2009)(I shortened every entry for brevity's sake)

1. Education — Gingrich backed federal education funding from his earliest days in office, though the Constitution gives absolutely no authority over education to any branch of the federal government. He helped garner support to create President Jimmy Carter’s Department of Education in 1979.

2. Foreign Aid — Gingrich voted numerous times throughout his 20 years in Congress to increase and expand unconstitutional foreign aid and trade. He supported both subsidized trade with the Soviets and federally funded loans to foreign governments through the Export-Import Bank. Between 1994 and 1995, Gingrich voted for $44.8 billion in foreign aid. He also helped push through federally funded loan guarantees to China. Today, that murderous communist regime is the largest holder of U.S. debt in the world.

3. NAFTA and GATT - Gingrich knew GATT sounded the death knell for American sovereignty. In testimony before the House Ways and Means Committee prior to the lame-duck session, he said, "We need to be honest about the fact that we are transferring from the United States at a practical level significant authority to a new organization.... This is not just another trade agreement. This is adopting something which twice, once in the 1940s and once in the 1950s, the U.S. Congress rejected.... It is a very big transfer of power."

4. Contract With America — Another con-game Gingrich played was the much-acclaimed "Contract With America," the Republican Party’s supposed answer to big government. It turned out to be a public relations smokescreen to cover various unconstitutional measures that Congress planned to pass under Gingrich’s leadership. The Contract included a "balanced budget amendment," which amounted to a Republican excuse to continue spending while claiming to fight for fiscal conservatism. If the government only spent money on constitutional programs, the deficit would take care of itself.(examples given in the link)

5. School Prayer Amendment — The proposed balanced budget amendment was not Gingrich's only attempt to change the Constitution. He also pushed hard for a school prayer amendment to allow America's children to pray in schools. It was just another shameless publicity stunt, for Gingrich knows the main obstacle to prayer in schools is not a faulty Constitution but an overambitious Supreme Court. Had he truly wanted to release the federal stranglehold on prayer in schools, Gingrich could have employed Congress' constitutionally authorized power to restrict the Supreme Court's appellate jurisdiction of the issue.

6. Clinton's GOP (Grand Old Pal) - In 1995, Time magazine named Newt Gingrich "Man of the Year," characterizing him as a states' rights conservative and the Republican answer to Bill Clinton. The ironic thing about Time magazine's 1995 claim is that in June of that year, Gingrich and Clinton both agreed at a debate in Clare-mont, New Hampshire, that they were "not far apart" in their views.

Futurist

In 1994, Gingrich described himself as "a conservative futurist." He said that those who were trying to define him should look no further than The Third Wave, a 1980 book written by Alvin Toffler. The book describes our society as entering a post-industrial phase in which abortion, homosexuality, promiscuity, and divorce are perfectly normal, even virtuous. Toffler penned a letter to America’s "founding parents," in which he said: "The system of government you fashioned, including the very principles on which you based it, is increasingly obsolete, and hence increasingly, if inadvertently, oppressive and dangerous to our welfare. It must be radically changed and a new system of government invented — a democracy for the 21st century." He went on to describe our constitutional system as one that "served us so well for so long, and that now must, in its turn, die and be replaced."

[RKBA Democrat]

Naaah. The tea party has already largely slid into irrelevance. The dems and gop have more than 150 years of experience in marginalizing, coopting, and defeating any upstarts that dare challege their cozy position.

They’re very, very good at it.

[PapaNew]

The Establishment’s Conservative

Oxymoron. Here's an exemplary and symbolic video of how true conservative Reagan had to deal with the Republican establishment who truly wanted to take the microphone away from his candidacy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OO2_49TycdE

[Castigar]

‘”..., the driving force in national politics has been the Tea Party, whose founding myth was that ordinary citizens were rising up in defiant objection...”

Founding MYTH?

That was the end of it right there for me.

[newzjunkey]

These are the same criticisms I see from Ron Paul followers and the John Birch Society.

[G Larry]

Yes Guy, we know you and Hugh Hewitt are big Romney supporters and you’re all enamored with that “Center Right” stuff....

But America needs a sharp right turn NOW!

Having Romney in there compromising gradual change, playing patty-cake with the libs is NOT the answer.

America needs a fighter, capable of punching the libs in the mouth as necessary.

Newt is the man for that job!

We can elect the conservative saints later, after America has been turned from the brink, on which it finds itself today.

[Talisker]

Naaah. The tea party has already largely slid into irrelevance. The dems and gop have more than 150 years of experience in marginalizing, coopting, and defeating any upstarts that dare challege their cozy position. They’re very, very good at it.

Dream on. The only thing they're "very, very good at" is denial. Take your navel-gazing (or whatever it is you're looking at) back to DU, well-named "RKBA Democrat."

[tennmountainman]

I agree with some of your points. The Tea Party is not ilrevelant, but u are right in that most of those sent in 2010 have been co-opted by Bonehead, Cantor and the rest of the DC GOP hacks.

So in that respect, what good does it do to send them to DC, when DC co-ops them. They end up voting like RINO’s anyway.

[mrsmith]

Newt, or whomever is the candidate, won’t cost us one Tea Party House seat.

Only complacency now can do that.

[Servant of the Cross]

Guy Benson at townhall.com is commenting on the liberal Joshua Green article at the Globe. Benson likely disagrees with his own article headline.

Benson says ... Green, whose piece makes clear he's not a great fan of the Tea Party movement, also sets his sights on Gingrich's own flip-flop handicap ...

and ... The counterpoint to Green's column, I suppose, is that Newt has at least made a conscious effort to reach out to Tea Partiers over the last two years -- a distinctly friendlier tack than Romney's awkward semi-embrace. Still, is it premature or hypocritical for conservatives to appoint Gingrich as the acceptable non-Romney alternative? Many conservatives don't seem to think so. The national numbers are trending strongly in Newt's favor, and some key primary state polls are almost other-worldly ...

[rintense]

Sunday, December 04, 2011 10:32:37 AM · 92 of 139
rintense to Absolutely Nobama

There's a very important part of Cain's media lynching that most are ignoring. And it's the simple fact that this wasn't as much about Cain as it was destroying the Tea Party movement.

The three people who were most closely tied to the Tea Party, Sarah Palin, Michele Bachmann, and Herman Cain, are gone or have been so severely maligned, any chance at a national comeback is slim. Ironically, the only one of those three who has been completely 'vetted' by the MSM is Palin, who by her own choice has decided not to run. We can only hope she reconsiders, but don't count on it.

With the Tea Party influence pretty much gone, there will be a mad scramble between Newt and Romney to claim the movement when, in fact, both are so far removed from the original cause, its almost unthinkable that any support would happen. Romney represents the Obamacare, and Newt the beltway, insider politic- two of the main things the Tea Party has been fighting against. Both have a history of supporting liberal legislation and causes. And most importantly, both have a history of stabbing conservatives in the back.

So what happens to the Tea Party if it rallies behind Newt or Romney? Quite simply, it kills itself. Because the very things it rallied against will be the very thing it has come to support.

And the media will have a field day with it, knowing once and for all, THEY have destroyed the Tea Party, relegating any true conservative momentum under the entrenched elitists beltway bus.

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[mrsmith]

I’m VERY happy with my ‘Tea Party’ Representative.
But the Leadership has failed us.

About 40-50 more Tea Party Representatives are needed to elect a Tea Party Majority Leader and run the House.

That’s an attainable, and exciting, goal.

[tennmountainman]

Maybe your’s is one of a few that Bonehead has not turned.
Good for your district. Most of the 2010 Class have already been turned.

[RKBA Democrat]

“Take your navel-gazing (or whatever it is you’re looking at) back to DU, well-named “RKBA Democrat.”

Given that I’ve been on FR for several years longer than you have, I think I’ll just invite you to go stick it with regard to going to DU.

As for your underlying argument that the tea party is still alive and vibrant, you offer what to justify your hypothesis? Will you feel the same way when mittens ends up the gop nominee?

So much for the tea party’s influence.

The tea party, which I happen to strongly agree with btw, has largely fizzled. I don’t happen to like it, but denying reality isn’t going to change it.

[katiedidit1]

Excellent post! Boston Globe = Mitt Romney...

[katiedidit1]

Disagree with your “excerpts” on Newt but do agree the Boston Globe is PRO Romney

[RKBA Democrat]

“The Tea Party is not ilrevelant, but u are right in that most of those sent in 2010 have been co-opted by Bonehead, Cantor and the rest of the DC GOP hacks.”

Like I said, they’ve been playing this game a looooong time and are very good at it.

[cripplecreek]

As my congressman told me. The tea party came out in force and helped elect him, then when home to sleep. The democrats and unions were waiting.

[USS Alaska]

With the Tea Party influence pretty much gone,

In the beginning, they didn't recognize us, then they denigrated us and called us racists, bigots, redneck homophobes and claimed that we wouldn't last.

Then came the 2010 elections and we kicked ass all over America, but the media dwells on the one or two defeats {and it makes them feel better}.

Now, before a single vote has been cast, the TEA party influence is "pretty much gone".

Me thinks, this is called whistling past the graveyard.

My local congress critters {both state and federal} know that the TEA party is still alive, {we were at a meeting last week} and they get our emails and phone calls, so at least my elected officials don't think the TEA party influence is "pretty much gone" because if we sense that they do, then "they will be pretty much gone".

[DannyTN]

The Tea Party hasn’t failed in this race, because the issues they care about are being discussed at the national level in the campaigns.

From the excerpt, I assume the author thinks they failed because of the lack of a candidate from among the tea party ranks, or because of the lack of a candidate that is fully aligned with Tea Party objectives.