Posted on 01/24/2012 2:36:34 PM PST by American Dream 246
Gingrich a star on Reagan team: Romney "work product" as conservative at issue. Mitt Romney has raised the issue of Newt Gingrich's "work product." Wow. Intended to prod the former Speaker on the issue of his work for Freddie Mac (Gingrich last night released his contract with Freddie), the question, as seems to be a Romney characteristic, has clumsily backfired. It raises an all-too obvious question that is becoming increasingly revealing.
What is Mitt Romney's "work product" for the conservative cause?
The closest Mitt Romney ever got to the Reagan Revolution is apparently because he reads about it 30 years later. And he isn't even reading everything he should. This is the man, remember, who proudly professed when running against Ted Kennedy in 1994: "I was an independent during the time of Reagan-Bush. I'm not trying to return to Reagan-Bush"
A peculiar stance considering Reagan carried Massachusetts twice in his two presidential landslides. Romney now assures that Newt Gingrich -- who actually had a serious and considerably well-known role working with Reagan -- had little role in it. (By the way, Reagan won over 1, 310, 936 votes and over 51 percent in Massachusetts in his 1984 re-election race, while Romney won his solitary gubernatorial victory in 2002 with 1,091,988 votes and 49.77 percent. Which is to say, Reagan outpolled Romney by over 200,000. In 1980, third party candidate John Anderson drew off 15 percent of Reagan's vote, otherwise, one suspects, Reagan would have trumped Romney then as well.) Why? Why is Romney going after Gingrich on his supposed lack of Reagan ties?
(Excerpt) Read more at spectator.org ...
(Newt as one of the Best of Reagan's Lieutenant's:)
"...It is crystal clear that in the narrowing choice between Gingrich and Mitt Romney, it is decidedly Gingrich whose "work product" as a card-carrying member of the Reagan Revolution is repeatedly marked with the contributions of the type that landed him in Michael Evans book of photographs of "the most important players of the Reagan era."
Why did Newt Gingrich win South Carolina?..........Because he was one of Reagan's Lieutenants..... A member of Reagan's Murderers Row of conservative stars.........The kind of contributions, the kind of vision and the kind of boldness that won him the respect and votes of South Carolina voters across the board.
Newt Gingrich's "work product" in the Reagan years was and remains highly visible and on the historical record. Unlike Mitt Romney, Newt Gingrich was not busy defensively claiming his independence and running from Reagan.
There are many who believe the ethics charges against Speaker Gingrich, charges Romney is now trying to use against Gingrich, were made up and sold to a Gingrich-hating media by livid congressional liberals as payback for both nailing Wright and humiliating O'Neill -- not to mention Gingrich's role in electing a GOP House for the first time in forty years..... For Romney to be following this line gives the impression he can be easily taken in by both the liberal media and the anti-Newt Democrats and GOP Establishment.
Quite to the contrary of the Romney message, Newt Gingrich was in fact 'one of Reagan's Young Lieutenants'. ONE OF THE BEST!
http://spectator.org/archives/2012/01/24/reagans-young-lieutenant/
“You will be getting the 2012 version which is about 16 years older and wiser. Everyone mellows with time”
I agree with that assessment. GO NEWT GO!
Here’s my Cliff’s Notes version of the article...
Evans had the idea to make a list of the most influential people of the day in Washington, inveigle them to his studio, and take a quite personal black-and-white photo of each.
Photographer Evans selected only 19 members of the 435-member House of Representatives for his book featuring 139 people.
But there, selected as one of the 19, was Newt Gingrich.
Newt Gingrich was part of the Reagan Revolution’s Murderers’ Row. And anybody who was in Washington in the day, much less in the Reagan White House or the 1984 Reagan re-election campaign (and I would make that particular cut of three), knew it.
Lewis began meeting with key members already elected to the Platform Committee.
One of the first? That would be young Congressman Newt Gingrich, already serving as a member of the Platform Committee’s executive committee. The meeting took place in Gingrich’s basement book-lined House office, a cramped affair reflecting precisely how junior in rank Gingrich actually was in the House pecking order. The three of us — Lewis, Gingrich, and myself — sat for over an hour talking about what Newt saw as the problems ahead.
The meeting was pure Newt Gingrich. Precisely the kind of talk that so struck the Republican voters of South Carolina the other day and has captured Gingrich such a following in the GOP debates. It was filled with polite if barely disguised disdain for the American Left in general, and what he would later refer to as “the old, passive and reactive Republican party.”
Specifically in focus was Gingrich’s fear that the Republican RINO/Establishment members on the Platform Committee — specifically this meant people like then-Kansas Senator Bob Dole (the chairman of the Senate Finance Committee)...would somehow try and moderate the Reagan Revolution with calls for tax increases or somehow lessening the Reagan demand for American military superiority over the Soviet Union.
Gingrich’s fears were realized in spades. All hell broke loose as Senator Dole — carrying the prestige of the chairmanship of the Senate’s tax writing committee — insisted on an open-ended plank on taxes that would accept a tax increase as a “last resort.”
Newt struck back. Hard. In private session — and public...Newt Gingrich raised holy hell.
Bob Dole, Newt snapped at one point, was nothing other than the “tax collector for the welfare state.”
Meanwhile, on the phone were all manner of people furious with Newt Gingrich.
Who was Newt Gingrich to be deciding on the tax prerogatives of the Treasury Secretary?
At the insistence of Gingrich and Kemp...a sentence that kept the door open for tax increases had a comma added to it after the word “taxes.”
The sentence now read subtly but considerably different: “We therefore oppose any attempts to increase taxes, which would harm the recovery and reverse the trend to restoring control of the economy to individual Americans.”
The Gingrich work product? Making certain that Ronald Reagan was not put on record leaving the door open for any more ill-fated tax increases. Dole was furious with the young Newt — and, it might be noted, recently made a point of endorsing Mitt Romney. Hmmmmm.
THE OTHER EXAMPLE of the kind of “work product” from Newt Gingrich that week was his opposition to Senator Warner’s insistence that the word “superiority” be stricken from the national security section of the platform — a word the Reaganites had insisted be in the 1980 platform.
Gingrich insisted on inserting language saying that the U.S. must be “stronger than any potential adversary.”
Is it any wonder the Washington Republican Establishment can’t stand Newt Gingrich?
Newt Gingrich was out there again and again and again for Ronald Reagan and conservative principles.
It was Newt Gingrich who came up with the idea in 1984 of using what were called “special orders” — a moment for House members at the end of the work day to stand in the well of the House and give speeches on the subject of their choice. With C-SPAN cameras newly present, Gingrich used these moments to launch a fusillade of attacks on liberals, enraging Speaker O’Neill...
The news was everywhere, and the Republican caucus of the day promptly gave Gingrich something South Carolinians did three times at the last two debates: a standing ovation.
It was Gingrich who boldly filed the ethics charges against the powerful Speaker Wright in 1988 — charges that eventually forced Wright to resign as Speaker in 1989. There are many who believe the ethics charges against Speaker Gingrich, charges Romney is now trying to use against Gingrich, were made up and sold to a Gingrich-hating media by livid congressional liberals as payback for both nailing Wright and humiliating O’Neill — not to mention Gingrich’s role in electing a GOP House for the first time in forty years. For Romney to be following this line gives the impression he can be easily taken in by both the liberal media and the anti-Newt Democrats and GOP Establishment.
Unlike Mitt Romney, Newt Gingrich was not busy defensively claiming his independence and running from Reagan.
He never failed Ronald Reagan or the cause both believed in so passionately. Newt never wavered, and he always led. “Ronald Reagan is the only coherent revolutionary in an administration of accommodationist advisers,” Gingrich is quoted as saying in Steven F. Hayward’s The Age of Reagan: The Conservative Counterrevolution 1980-1989.
in the narrowing choice between Gingrich and Mitt Romney, it is decidedly Gingrich whose “work product” as a card-carrying member of the Reagan Revolution is repeatedly marked with...The kind of contributions, the kind of vision and the kind of boldness that won him the respect and votes of South Carolina voters across the board.
...in one instance towards the end of the administration, Gingrich discussed complaints about things left undone. “Reagan put his arm around the young Georgia Congressman and said in his typically gentle fashion, ‘Well, some things you’re just going to have to do after I’m gone.’”
...some version of those gentle words from Ronald Reagan when he put his arm around a young Newt Gingrich is in fact driving the older Newt Gingrich in this campaign.
...quite unlike the picture Romney is trying to paint of his prime opponent in South Carolina, Newt Gingrich was very much present and accounted for on the Reagan team. To borrow from Reagan’s farewell address to the nation and the men and women who served him, Newt Gingrich wasn’t just marking time. He made a difference. He helped make that City on a Shining Hill stronger. He helped make the City freer.
Quite to the contrary of the Romney message, Newt Gingrich was in fact one of Reagan’s Young Lieutenants.
One of the best.
“...Gingrich is a flawed man, for sure. ...”
Good point. Everybody is flawed.
To my mind, it’s about time we start concentrating on the blatant flaws of the ‘tards “across the aisle” and start elevating THEIR flaws for the public to see.
“...political disgrace doesn’t seem so disgraceful in hindsight...”
What’s even MORE disgraceful is how this administration was allowed to run amok and basically shove their agenda up our arse end since they “seized control of Congress” in 2006 and then “seized power” in the 2008 Elections.
The greatest of the original anti RINOS still alive today!
Newton Leroy Gingrich!
GO NEWT!
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.
The most vicious investigative body there is-— the IRS— investigated EVERYTHING about the central point of the democrat’s witch hunt of Gingrich (helped by the newly “teated” RINOS to be in the Class of 94).
The IRS report on Gingrich is something to marvel at... it completely exonerated Gingrich. So, do you KNOW that? Or you trust romney’s false talking points.
What you had with Newt in this witch hunt was a concerted effort by inside the beltway establishment to get him gone— the same people who hated Ronald Reagan. OK?
Newt scares these lazy psuedo conservatives and rino powerbrokers who talk one game but do another.
That last post was directed to Vigilanteman, and intended as a cc to you. Deo Vindice.
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!
I like that.
Newt saw the RINo's for what they were and never backed off. And, he's still at it.
I agree!
Newt has been fighting for us for a LONG time and deserves our support!
“I think Newt wants to leave a legacy as a president who restored the constitutional republic. I believe he will do the things he is saying he will do if elected.”
Absolutely, and that’s why we can trust his sincerity.
Very astute observation - great interview and answers to Romney’s bogus accusations tonight (Wednesday) on Hannity, BTW.
“I saw ample evidence last night that Romney has been getting intensive debate coaching. Romney has become an extremely dangerous debater.”
i disagree - BHO would mop the floor with deer-in-the-headlights Mittens.
BTW - GREAT interview with Newt tonight on Hannity (Wed.) and his detailed answers to every recent Romney false accusation.
Great interview -
Great interview -
Great interview - And Newt answers Romney’s false charges:
Great interview - And Newt answers Romney’s false charges:
Brian Williams purposely cut Newt off during his answers - Newt was not “overwhelmed”. He was taking each question on when he was interrupted.
Great interview - And Newt answers Romney’s false charges:
JJ - Wonderful post. I so wish that everyone on FR would read that. Way too many naysayers of Newt here. But to me, it’s so obvious that he’s the ONLY one who can stand up to BHO, the media and the GOP elites.
Many are either misinformed or just plain mistaken.
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