Posted on 12/02/2011 11:47:37 AM PST by Cincinatus' Wife
...Since Gingrich had taken control in January 1995, Republicans in the House had held together. Focused on fulfilling the Contract with America, they passed a flurry of legislation, which kept them occupied — and their divisions concealed — for the first two years.
By July 1997, however, the contract was finished, and conservatives, particularly those elected in the Revolution of ’94, were growing frustrated with Gingrich’s leadership.
The speaker was disorganized. “He knew nothing about running meetings and nothing about driving an agenda,” DeLay writes in his memoir, No Retreat, No Surrender.
He was erratic. “On Monday, we would say we’re not going to give a $500 child tax credit to people who don’t have tax liabilities,” Graham tells National Review Online. “On Wednesday, he’d meet with President Clinton, and that position would change.”
“In May 1997 . . . Newt declared the GOP willing to separate tax cuts from other items in a balanced-budget deal that we were negotiating with Bill Clinton,” writes former speaker Denny Hastert (R., Ill.) in his memoir, Speaker. “That was news to us and represented a huge change in policy in less than twenty-four hours.”
He was hyperbolic. “He’d call something ‘the single most corrupt act in the history of Western civilization’ . . . always these Armageddon-type announcements,” says Rep. Pete King (R., N.Y.).
The congressman still remembers that fateful trip on Air Force One in November 1995, when Clinton made Gingrich sit in the back. Miffed, the speaker later asked the press, “You just wonder, where is their sense of manners? Where is their sense of courtesy?”
“I still think it’s the main reason we lost [the government-shutdown] debate,” King says.
“Before the government shutdown we thought Newt Gingrich was invincible,” writes Sen. Tom Coburn (R., Okla.) in his memoir, Breach of Trust. “After the shutdown, however, he was like a whipped dog who still barked, yet cowered, in Clinton’s presence.”...... Continued
“No one else has any sort of track record that indicates they have actually done anything at all similar to ACCOMPLISHING a real SHAKE UP in D.C. with TANGIBLE CONSERVATIVE RESULTS!”
Well, gee, I don’t know...the rebellion against Newt was led from behind by John Boehner...Newt evidently wasn’t conservative enough for John...he’s been just magnificent. Ended up with a big job eventually, too! Weird that would happen.
While I agree with you on the dangers of the unexplored Newt, there is still no way in cowboy hell that I am going to vote for a Rick Perry.
yeah many married Perry too quickly and look what happened?
GO NEWT
and Hastert? didnt he get into some trouble too? I remember Newt as Speaker and his accomplishments were great. As for the seat in the back of the plane it was rude and done to slight him. However, IF I were Newt..the further away from that bunch ..the better. Heck I would have sat in the rear john
who has done more for the Conservative movement in this country than anyone else...Perry, Romney or Gingrich?
As you know, I am (maybe was) a Cain supporter. I gave him $100, the only candidate to get money from me. I can support Newt because I know his Strengths and I know his weaknesses. With Cain, he had only been on the scene a short while so first I got to know his strengths, then his weakness- that really deflated the ballon. With Newt, it is all you see is all you get.
No. Perry was a West Texas conservative Democrat one of the "Pit Bulls" who fought spending. He crossed over to the GOP in 1989 after they'd begun building a party in Texas. In 1998 Rick Perry became the first Republican Lt. Gov. of Texas since Reconstruction. In 2010 he became the longest serving Texas governor and brought with him a GOP super majority. He's served 2 times as Chairman of the Republican Governors Association and broke fundraising records.
If Hitler invaded hell I would make at least a favorable reference to the devil in the House of Commons.
In war as in life, it is often necessary when some cherished scheme has failed, to take up the best alternative open, and if so, it is folly not to work for it with all your might.
- Winston Churchill.
Class never tries to build itself up by tearing others down.
I would have to say Gov. Rick Perry. Look at Texas! His mantra of roll back litigation, regulation and lower taxes (which he has done here in Texas) would work for the country. These fights he's led have kept Texas the shining example of what Americans do with government off their backs.
Newt has prospered well from his government contacts parlayed into profiting from Freddie Mac and the health care industry.
Romney??? He was the Gov of Mass and passed mandated health care.
Just wondering, but how much did any of those mentioned in the article do for conservatism after Newt left? Did the Republican party become more or less conservative in congress? Seems to me they went way “country club” after he left.
Why? So you can come by and compliment him? I'll be sure to ping you.
There is no bigger pompous gasbag in Washington that Newt. Well, maybe Obama.
And I wouldn’t trust either. Think long and hard before throwing your lot in with Newt.
I’m starting to think conservatives, generally speaking, have no memory or intelligence.
In fact, I’m just going to say that’s what I think.
I am, of course, talking about Newt Gingrich. I am, quite frankly, in a state of shock at the stupidity of support for him. He is a mean, insufferable, arrogant, pompous Rockefeller Republican, an ethanol-subsidizing global-warming crony-capitalist ludicrously hypocritical pretend conservative.
Here is just the start, just a hint, of his anti-conservative actions (provided by a friend):
04/02/1987 - cosponsored the 1987 Fairness Doctrine
10/22/1991 - voted for an amendment that would create a National Police Corps.
03/--/1993 - voted for sending $1.6 billion in foreign aid to Russia.
1/27/1994 - supported the GATT Treaty giving sovereignty to the U.N.
08/27/1995 - suggests that drug smuggling should carry a death sentence.
04/25/1996 - voted for the then single largest increase on federal education spending ($3.5 billion)
04/10/1995 - supported federal taxdollars being spent on abortions.
06/01/1996 - helped a Democrat switch parties in an attempt to defeat constitutionalist Ron Paul in the 1996 election.
09/25/1996 - introduced H.R. 4170, demanded life-sentence or execution for someone bringing 2 ounces of marijuana across the border.
01/22/1997 - Congress gave him a record-setting $300,000 fine for ethical wrongdoing.
11/29/2006 - said that free speech should be curtailed in order to fight terrorism, called for a "serious debate about the 1st Amendment."
02/15/2007 - supports Bush's proposal for mandatory carbon caps.
09/28/2008 - says if in office, he would have reluctantly voted for the $700B TARP bailout.
09/30/2008 - releases his book A Contract with the Earth which embraces man-made global warming.
12/08/2008 - paid $300,000 by Freddie Mac to halt Congress from bringing necessary reform.
03/31/2009 - says we should have Singapore-style drug tests for Americans.
11/15/2010 - defends Romneycare
01/30/2011 - lobbies for ethanol subsidies.
01/30/2011 - suggests that flex-fuel vehicles be mandated for Americans.
02/13/2011 - criticizes Obama for sending less U.S. taxdollars to Egypt.
03/09/2011 - blames his infidelity to multiple wives on his passion for the country.
03/15/2011 - says that NAFTA worked because it created jobs in Mexico.
03/19/2011 - has no regrets about supporting Medicare drug coverage. (now $7.2T unfunded liability)
03/23/2011 - completely flip-flops on Libyan intervention in 16 days.
03/25/2011 - plans to sign as many as 200 executive orders on his first day as president.
04/25/2011 - admits he is a paid lobbyist for federal ethanol subsidies.
07/15/2011 - his poorly managed campaign is over $1 million in debt.
08/01/2011 - hires a company to create fake Twitters to appear as if had a following.
11/16/2011 - revealed he actually received $1.6 million lobbying for Freddie Mac, vs. his previously stated $300,000
This list could go on and on. Here's more. Further, he has no executive or private business experience whatever. Until he cashed in with lobbying contracts after he resigned from Congress in 1999, he never worked a day in the private sector. Like Zero, he taught at a state school (University of West Georgia) until becoming a professional politician (Congressman from Georgia 1979-1999). He is an ultimate Washington insider.
Did you read “conservatives” were unhappy with Newt in that article? YES! it’s there. Make Newt lemonade all you want, and dump a lot of sugar in it, to make it palatable.
Newt is also a quitter, quit his House set in 1998....so he lost his job as Speaker, he still let down his constituents.
What exactly does this story have to do with Perry? Nothing. If you are going to use the Perry ping list on stories that merely bash the other candidates, you can take me off.Thank you, thank you, thank you!
I got in a big argument about this on another thread with one of the Perry people (who is on this thread and I don't want to name because I don't want to get into it all over again).
Certain Perry supporters have really changed.
They used to be just Perry supporters.
Now they are front-runner-bashers.
That's a big change.
I can't help thinking the change is orchestrated.
Orchestrated, bought and paid for.
(What else is Perry going to do with campaign war chest, throw a party for his 216 remaining supporters? That won't cost much. So I'm sure he's got an Internet Posting Budget and there are some FReepers [at least one I can think of but won't name because I don't want to go round and round and round again] who are on the payroll.)
“Focused on fulfilling the Contract with America, they passed a ‘FLURRY OF LEGISLATION’, which kept them occupied — and their divisions concealed — for the first two years.”
Newt is great at talking the talk. In wagging his tongue over the years he has been all over the spectrum, keeping himself in it. This may win elections, and ridding the executive branch of the ‘anti-executive’ (follower)this election cycle is paramount, but this child has little confidence that Gingrich can help himself resist the temptations of power to be something to everyone. Newt is no conservative, and it is a disservice to suggest Newt is helping, or representing ‘Tea Party’ thought.
Thanks for that ping. I had never seen the Coburn quote. Newt’s FR backers apparently labor under the impression that since the MSM is leaving Newt alone now, they will do likewise in the general. Actually, they’re just destroying the true threats now, so they can have a heyday w Newt or Romney later. By the time they’re done w Newt, his own mother probably wouldn’t vote for him—and ‘the Gingrich that Stole Christmas’ will look like a lovesick valentine card.
Getting Newt as the nominee is one of the few ways Obama could win. Those who think otherwise are just not up to speed w how the MSM destroys GOP nominees. Their attack will be sustained, relentless, vicious, and above all independent of the truth. Sure, Newt has given them ammo. But when you control the mainstream of the media and employ ends-justify-the-means lies and smears, the sky—or the gutter—is the limit. Outside of the desperate, anybody but Romney primary true believers, Newt is not that popular or likeable. But just wait until he is slimed 24/7 leading up to Nov ‘12. He will make Obama look popular by comparison (if he’s the nominee).
And no, I’m not arguing for Romney. I have a long posting history of ripping into Romney like a Cuisinart liquifying a banana. But Newt would fare even more poorly in the general. He is, at this stage, a lot like the Titanic before the crossing. He looks pretty good in home port, but he hasn’t encountered the icebergs yet.
I want to beat Obama as much or more than any conservative alive. But Newt is not the way to make that happen.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.