Two claim Gingrich lobbied in ’03

DesMoines Register | December 28, 2011 | Tony Leys

[Cincinatus' Wife]

Link only due to posting restrictions

The LINKED article describes Newt Gingrich and a meeting in 2003 with members of Congress urging their support on the Medicare Expansion Bill after he'd left Congress. (It passed -- barely)

The people interviewed are U.S. Rep. Jeff Flake (AZ- 6th) and former congressman Butch Otter (both have endorsed Romney). Otter is now the governor of Idaho. They feel Newt Gingrich was lobbying.

Newt and others dispute this.

You can decide.

[Redmen4ever]

Newt was paid tens of millions of dollars by the healthcare industry (and nearly two million by the federal mortgage makers). He says all he did was offer them “strategic advice.” He didn’t lobby.

[Cincinatus' Wife]

Did Perry bring Karl Rove on board?

Rove's Crossroads PAC, money and mouth are with Mitt Romney.

Care to comment on Newt?

[Cincinatus' Wife]

Did you even bother to read my first post?

Probably not. It takes some thinking skills.

You just blindly attack.

[McGavin999]

I noticed that, just attack you and attack Perry despite the fact that the article is about what Romney supporters are saying. These enophites would rather wait until Obama is attacking before they wake up and realize the primaries are for preparation. Dumb dumber and dumbest!

[Cincinatus' Wife]

You’d think I was making this stuff up!

This is something that needs to be read and absorbed.

And as you allude, better now than later.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2825770/posts

[Josh Painter]

Sorry, I can understand someone endorsing Romney in ‘08 when the only real alternatives were John McCain and Barack Hussein Obama. It was choosing the lesser of the evils when the only available choices were evils.

But there’s no excuse for any conservative to endorse liberal Romney this early in this election cycle when there are a number of more conservative alternatives.

No excuse whatsoever.

[PieterCasparzen]

Newt and Romney are the same - establishment candidates. Newt is merely the backup for he establishment if Romney falls on his face. Newt is 2nd string establishment.

Any conservative in their right mind who is not incredibly intellectually lazy would do 5 minutes of web search on Newt and quickly surmise that Newt is smart enough, politically crafty enough, and compromising enough to do enormous damage to the country, since they could not help but come across his decade-long lobbying career since he left the House, which perhaps only he and Republicans fearful of “losing” the election, refuse to admit was lobbying.

Romney, of course, was the Republican “heir apparent”, meaning all the kings horse’s and men would line up behind him to continue on the path of Rome (grand scheme of global finance and laissez-faire morality that ends in national destruction).

It’s a question between those two of which would lead America further down the road to destruction in 4 years. And both, contrary to what some conservatives think, would be on a par with Obama.

Homeland Security overreach would continue as would islamic, leftist and homosexual appeasement, etc. Newt purporting to come out “hard right” in terms of the judiciary, etc., would simply be used by him with Democrats as a bargaining chip to get his legislation passed. A President, he would say, has to govern from the center.

Of course, I’m a Bachmann and then Santorum person, I know you’re a Perry person. And Perry does not have the laser-like wit or smoothness of N and R. I see Perry as not being able to stand up to lobbying pressure as well as Bachmann or Santorum, IMHO. It is interesting though to me as one who desires restraint of the Federal beast, that Perry’s support is so concentrated in Texas. All in all, he could be much better at blocking the progress of the beast than Newt or Mitt, both of which are quite scary, IMHO.

Let’s face it; any Republican administration will face 4 years of having everything including the kitchen sink thrown at it in an attempt to block it at every move and disparage the convervative and even more so the Republican brand. IMHO, we might as well gain some yardage for true conservative principles since we’ll be taking the flak anyway. A compromiser President will not look to gain yardage on such issues, but simply to make the economy look and feel better after 4 years. If the President is not a die-hard conservative and not actually advancing the right issues but negotiating them away in exchange for trade legislation, etc., America would be sliding into the pit of secular-humanist socialism anyway as it is now.

I’m still a Bachmann supporter, but Perry, IMHO, is certainly preferable to Newt or Romney.

[Cincinatus' Wife]

Thank you for a thoughtful post.

Here is a bit about Gov. Perry you many not recognize but this is pure Perry (I’ve posted much about him but mostly the threads were hijacked to drive people away). But these two incidents are instruct of a broader governing style.

http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/276264/vetoes-rick-perry-katrina-trinko

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2787263/posts

A Postscript to that second link is that the group who opposed Perry and supported his opponent because of his veto, The Texas Medical Association, endorsed him for president, and its members are helping him raise money and make connections with medical groups in other states.

Gov. Perry stands on principle and brings people along (maybe not at first but in time).

[txrangerette]

Another example of bringing people along after standing on principle...Perry tells Iowans he opposes energy subsidies from the federal level...be they ethanol, oil and gas, wind, solar, etc.

Hopefully Iowans will want to adopt this principle even though it would mean no more federal ethanol subsidies and mandates...

Because it is the right thing and the most economically viable thing to do.

And the most Constitutional.

[SatinDoll]

You have a reliable source for that which isn’t part of the MSM?

[SatinDoll]

Newt Gingrich worked as a contractor for Freddie Mac over a period of about 6-8 years during which he earned $1.6Million dollars. That is around $250,000 per year. His contract was not renewed. Call it as you like, but that is not lobbying.

And do I have source for the above? Yeah, Newt himself.

By comparison, I as a contract electrical designer, can earn up to $110,000 per year, excluding overtime.

Newt’s pay at Freddy Mac as a knowledgable policy wonk wasn’t outrageously high.

I haven’t looked into the “millions of dollars by the healthcare industry” claims, but soon will. I do not expect those charges to have any more validity than the ones about Freddie Mac.

[Redmen4ever]

Due to confidentiality clauses in our contracts, we are not releasing a list of our clients and members or information specific to any individual client or member.

check it our on:
http://www.gingrichgroup.com/

Sorry, you don’t get to know who have been Newt’s clients. They are protected by confidentiality agreements.

[Redmen4ever]

And beside $1.6 million is chump change as compared to the real money being taken out by Raines, et al.

[SatinDoll]

Freddie Mac already violated the confidentiality clause, and Newt responded.

He won’t go into detail exactly what he did at Freddie Mac, but he did describe how many years he was under contract and how much money he made.

Those confidentiality clauses will not protect any client who tries to leak disinformation. I believe Gingrich will sue the shit out of them if they try.

[KantianBurke]

"This is part of Newt Gingrich’s record and he will have to answer the questions."

He did:

"Gingrich addressed his support for the bill Wednesday after a campaign event in Iowa.

"I'm allowed as a citizen to say I'd like to see this passed and that's not lobbying," he told reporters in Mason City."

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2011/12/28/gingrich-urged-yes-vote-on-controversial-medicare-bill-congresswoman-says/?hpt=hp_t1

Whatever government funds Newt saved from his leadership days and the "Contract with America," all were spent and then some thanks to his support for Medicare Part D. This country is in hoc for BILLIONS due to that unfunded entitlement monstrosity. That Newt still supports that legislation should be the final straw. Meanwhile no thanks to Newt: