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Can someone, anyone, explain to me how Newt was elected Speaker of the House in 1995, by his fellow Republicans, if he was a loner and had no leadership ability?

Can anyone name a Speaker or Majority Leader since then who is more conservative or accomplished more to balance the budget and scale back government?

Can someone, anyone, explain to me how Newt was elected Speaker of the House in 1995, by his fellow Republicans, if he was a loner and had no leadership ability?

Newt was the visionary center of the GOP takeover. He's the one that came up with the Contract with America and drove the policy and ideological positions. However the one who really made it happen from a managerial (including fundraising) perspective was Haley Barbour.

I have a close friend who was the campaign manager to a member of the Congressional Class of 1995. During their first Caucus retreat Newt got a good, respectable applause. Barbour got a cheering, standing ovation that lasted for a couple minutes.

Can anyone name a Speaker or Majority Leader since then who is more conservative or accomplished more to balance the budget and scale back government?

The balanced budget was a combination of really good economic growth (driven by the dot.com boom), and the actions of Congressional GOP deficit-hawk leaders like Dick Armey and John Kasich. Newt was Speaker, so he gets credit as well, but he wasn't a one-man show and he certainly wasn't the one who was rolling up his sleeves and getting his hands dirty tinkering with the innards of the budget and approps bills.