As for Gingrich, please understand that my support for him is tentative and relative (don't we all hate that word!) to the other candidates and I repeat my plea that those who object to Gingrich should advance a worthy alternative. So far, only Palin has been mooted. Incidentally, my suspicion is that she will not run. That would be a great pity because she is truly an engaging personality as revealed by her television show about Alaska that I was watching on my computer here in Germany last night. I have seen no better uncontrived example of a real and genuine family which, considering the phoniness of the Clinton and Obama administrations, would indeed be a refreshing change in the White House.
I do not foreclose the real possibility that the primary process itself will reveal a true conservative leader. As of now, however, we are stuck with a process of elimination which leaves me, at least, with Gingrich.
As to Gingrich's alleged declensions concerning global warming, I repost my reply from yesterday on the subject:
"Before referring you to a sound conservative source, American Thinker, I would like to make the point that science is not the province of political ideology. In other words, we are either descended from the apes or we are not, the world is round or it is flat, but the scientific truth of these propositions is not ascertainable by political analysis. In other words, a conservative is entitled to believe in evolution or peak oil, as examples, and he is entitled to believe in anthropomorphic global warming, or climate change, and remain a legitimate conservative.
For the record, I do not believe in the scientific validity of anthropomorphic climate change but that is not because I am a scientist but only because I have weighed the evidence and conclude that the best odds are that the science is unclear, perhaps fraudulent, probably exaggerated, and the remedy unlikely to fix anything. But this conclusion is tentative. It is subject to further instruction and further proof. If I change my mind and become one who believes in anthropomorphic global climate change, it will not make me less of a conservative.
In this context please note the history of the time in which Gingrich accepted the "science" of global warming. This was long before the e-mails were released. Even now after the release of e-mails, it is still not politically correct to deny climate change. Consider this analogy: George Bush got a very important fact very wrong-there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq-but that did not mean that Bush lied, it meant that he made a mistake of fact. Gingrich deserves the same rights to make a plausible mistake of science.
But if I choose nonconservative solutions to climate change, then I am open to the charge of failing a legitimate conservative test. It is upon this line that I base my defense of Gingrich, and it is upon this line of reasoning that Gingrich himself defends his position.
Gingrich says:
"I want to suggest that we need a new science- and technology-based, entrepreneurial, market-oriented and locally led environmentalism."
[A concept Gingrich would essentially reiterate a year later when he speaks in the Gore-mercial of ] "spark[ing] the technology we need," not raising taxes or other big-government solutions."
I cite you an article from April 2008 in the American Thinker which is not favorable to Gingrich and his position on climate change. I put it forth because, on balance, I think his is a reasonable position to take and one which does not compromise a claim to legitimate conservatism. If you accept the premise, that one can believe in climate change and still be a conservative because it is a scientific and not a political question, then one must judge Gingrich on the quality of the conservative content of the solutions he espouses to anthropomorphic global climate change. I believe those solutions are conservative. The article provides contrary arguments ready made for you.
Here is the citation:
Newt's Global Warming Surprise
http://www.americanthinker.com/2008/04/newts_global_warming_surprise.html"
