In his own memoirs, The Politics of Diplomacy, James Baker noted of his days as Reagan White House Chief of Staff that he always "worked closely" with the people Baker described as "congressional leaders." And who were those leaders? Baker runs off a string of names of the older leaders of both House and Senate in the formal positions of power -- plus one. That's right: young Newt Gingrich.
Baker gives 19 names of both Republicans and Democrats, and ends with "and many others." Newt is number 7. Basically, he named pretty much everyone in a position of leadership who had a role in crafting policy. That's not a glowing endorsement of Newt as "Reagan's Young Lieutenant." Nor is the fact that some photographer chose Newt for one of the 19 photographs of Congresspeople to include in his book.
Read through the article closely. Lord doesn't make that good a case. A lot of what he says isn't very relevant. And he keeps repeating the "Young Lieutenant" line as though repetition alone will be convincing.
Maybe Newt was a key player in the Reagan years, but somebody else will have to make that case.
Newt Gingrich did something that Reagan wanted to do, but never accomplished; Newt balanced 4 budgets. I could make a strong case that in this regard Newt surpassed his mentor. What’s more relevant today? Winning the cold war or getting spending under control and balancing the budget? Newt’s done it before. That’s why he has my vote!