I just looked at Fred and I like what I see so far. He's my kind of guy.
Posted on 04/10/2007 1:19:25 PM PDT by xjcsa
In a heavily hyped debate – one that environmentalist Democrats hoped would be a “smack down” on Republicans -- former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich disappointed them and conservatives alike when he declared that human activity was causing the Earth to warm.
The concession was made in a debate on global warming with Sen. John Kerry (D.-Mass.) today on Capitol Hill that was sponsored by the Brookings Institution and the RAND Corporation.
In his first portion of allotted time Gingrich said there were two undisputed areas of scientific consensus on global warming: that the earth is getting hotter and the warming had been caused by human activity.
At one point, Kerry asked Gingrich what he would say to conservatives like Sen. James Inhofe (R.-Okla.) who do not believe global warming is caused by human activity. Gingrich said, "The evidence is sufficient that we should move to the most effective possible steps to reduce carbon."
“We should be moving to develop all kinds of new green technology,” Gingrich said. He challenged Kerry to find market-based solutions to reduce carbon emission instead of increasing environmental regulations.
“Regulation and litigation are the least effective ways of getting solutions,” the former Speaker said. “Reshaping markets with incentives are the fastest way.”
Kerry argued that environment laws drafted with help from the United Nations have been successful.
Kerry said the laws were “needed to create the leverage and the market so they would go out and invest in the technology because they don’t invest without it.” Government regulation, he said “is the only way to invite people to make that investment.”
“We are not arguing bureaucracy and regulation. We are arguing whether putting a price on carbon is bureaucracy.”
Kerry said it was not. “This is not bureaucracy. You set the standard the market will set the price,” he said. “We all live in a world where we don’t pay for the cost. We don’t pay for the loss of fish, we don’t pay for the lost of these species. None of that is priced into the goods today.”
Before launching into his initial speech, Gingrich endorsed the book Kerry had co-authored with his wife Teresa Heinz Kerry "This Moment on Earth.".
“This is excellent, this is a very good book,” he said. “I would commend this book to anyone who wants to see local leadership make a difference.” Gingrich said he didn’t agree with “about 60% of it” but would urge others to “read it because it’s an example of individual local leadership against the odds.”
Gingrich’s concession was expected in many news circles as part of his long-shot strategy to run for President in 2008. He has said since last year that he would make a decision to run or not sometime in the fall of this year. He is planning to release a new book, "Contract with the Earth" this November that he co-wrote with conservationist Terry Maples.
Yesterday, in his weekly email newsletter “Winning the Future” Gingrich said that September 27 would be “Solutions Day.” This is to honor the 13th anniversary of his 1994 “Contract with America.”
Last week, Gingrich called the Spanish language a “ghetto language.” Immediately after the mishap, he recorded an extensive apology, in Spanish, directed to the Hispanic community that made available on YouTube. Last month, he revealed to Focus on the Family’s James Dobson that he had an extramarital affair on Dobson’s radio show.
In January, Gingrich appeared at a hearing conducted by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to talk about how to stabilize Iraq.
I think that's what this was all about...hawking a new book. Too bad. I really thought he was the right guy. Now, I'm not so sure.
Is there one conservative out there, somewhere?
He is brilliant - and very flawed. No thanks.
I feel sorry for all of the Presidential candidates. Even the Socialists on the Dim side because they have it worse.
In the words of that great poet and philosopher William Joel:
“Say a word out of line,
And you find that the friends,
You had are all gone,
Forever,
Forever.”
They are walking on eggshells afraid that they will piss off somebody, somewhere. In Dim land you have the liberal anti war blogosphere, feminists, environmentalists, neo-Communists, PETA wackos.
And you know what goes on here in our ranks.
No wonder these poor folks are afraid of their own shadow and everything the do and say has to be carefully scripted. Then some pundit or journalist has the nerve to suggest that they just let loose and say what’s on their mind...bwwaaahhaaaahahahah!
It could be worse...me and you could be the poor sucker running for President. Better them than me! We can just sit there and pick them apart for sport.
In practice, yes, but I think Fred’s intentions were holding the majority - he even said so.
You were right. I was wrong. There I said it. What a wake up call this was.
Well, whatever. At least everyone found out before he started raising funds.
Give Fred a look.
I like what I've heard from him so far. Hope he runs.
I just looked at Fred and I like what I see so far. He's my kind of guy.
Whoops, please disregard the last comment. I just read the posts above you and it seems I had the wrong Fred in mind. Sorry about that.
Well, it’s good to see Newt has bowed out of any further political ambitions.
I like the guy, but his endorsement of the “global warming” con job shows me he is not leadership material.
Newt has jumped the shark.
I agree.
Was his hot sexytary third wife there?? Such a statesman pushing Global Scamming.
Pray for W and Our Troops
There is one guy that really does seem to speak his mind, and doesn't apologize later: Tom Tancredo.
But, I have my doubts that he could get nominated, let alone elected.
But, he may disappoint as well.
To a certain degree, I am in the ABG camp (anybody but Giuliani).
That’s the lone advantage that he and Ron Paul have by virtue of the fact that there is not a snowballs chance in Hell of them being elected. They can push the envelope and advance the discourse past scripted talking points.
That’s why we need people like them in the debates. Even if they don’t win, they can accomplish something.
See Barry Goldwater.
That would be a good point if he were suggesting incentives to solve a real problem. Here he's suggesting government incentives (which in this case are, in fact, regulations) to fix a PRETEND PROBLEM.
Caring does nothing. All of us "care" about the planet; "caring" isn't the issue. I care about the planet, but I also realize that global warming is a silly pretend problem, and that anything we do to solve a silly pretend problem is a complete waste of time and resources.
He also knows how to generate discussion and get people thinking in ways that may not appear on the surface to make conservative sense.
What the hell does that even mean? "Conservative sense"? It doesn't make any sense at all to jump on the bandwagon of a pretend problem.
Don’t bother running for office again, Newt...
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