Posted on 12/20/2011 4:24:14 AM PST by PieterCasparzen
Newt Gingrich earned some $600,000 as a consultant to a major ethanol lobbying group, not the $312,500 that the organization, called Growth Energy, disclosed last spring.
When quizzed by iWatch News in April, Growth Energy spokesman Chris Thorne said Gingrich’s contract ended after 2009. Attributing the mistake to an internal miscommunication, Thorne now says that Gingrich remained on the payroll through 2010 and earned an additional $262,500.
Thorne said that Gingrich continued to work for Growth Energy for the first few months of 2011 as well, but he could not say how much the former Speaker was paid.
Growth Energy was founded in late 2008 by the world’s top ethanol producer — the South Dakota based POET group — and other fuel companies to promote the use of the alternative fuel. According to the company’s Web site, Gingrich was paid to offer advice on “strategy and communication issues” and to “speak positively on ethanol related topics to the media.”
Gingrich’s ties to the industry have been a boon, no doubt, to his presidential campaign in a farm state like Iowa. But his embrace of federal ethanol subsidies has irritated some conservatives, who believe that government intervention in the economy violates free-market principles.
Gingrich got into a well-publicized spat with the editorial page editors of the Wall Street Journal — they called him “Professor Cornpone” — a year ago, compelling him to declare, “I am not a lobbyist for ethanol.”
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(Excerpt) Read more at njtoday.net ...
They never bother to say Obama has never really drawn a check from anything other than some sort of a "government entity".
DON’T YOU KNOW ???
As long as Newt can really hammer Obama in a debate, and he tells us that he’s sick of government like we are...
we’re all supposed to support him. Cuz he’s a Tea Party guy. Didn’t you know ???
He has told us that he will not shut down Fannie and Freddie, he believes there is such a thing as global warming caused by man, and he supports ethanol subsidies.
It does not matter what he says about lobbying and big-government policies that he has supported his whole career.
Michele Bachmann is “crazy” dontcha know.
Santorum is .... I don’t know... just don’t vote for him.
Vote for the lobby... I mean consultant. Vote ! Don’t go out there and search for what he said a few years back.
As long as you don’t vote for the other big-money-big-government guy, Romney. It’s real important, there are big differences between Mitt and Newt. Newt’s the one to vote for.
Dollars to donuts, whichever one wins will pick the other for their running mate. There’s no way Romney could resist the allure of having the biggest lobbyist since Abramoff as his VP.
Yes, Abramoff and Newt go way back as well.
Old “consulting” buddies.
***Without subsidies, this business is useless.***
Sad but true - here’s a list of teat-suckers (from taxpayer suckers) (leftist site?)
ETHANOL whore (Nancy Pelosi global warming anyone), Freddie Mac whore (Barney Frank buddy), how anyone who calls themselves a conservative can support the NEwtster is beyond me. The guy is a smooth talking carnival barker whose BS is matched only by his oversized ego. Stick a fork in him and get him off the stage.
Is there ONE who has vocally and consistently advocated a complete cutoff of such funding?
If there is (someone can remind me) I am not aware of who she/he is.
While I hate (and oppose, as do most Cons) this subsidy, it will not be a "deal breaker" for me as there are much more importing issues to contend with....such as our SURVIVAL and I support anyone who has the "stones" to call a spade (or in this case, Islam) a spade and will not only identify this evil, but will acknowledge it (and its belivers) are out to destroy us and the rest of the world.
Good for Newt.
I don’t have a problem with that.
‘earned it’ at the expense of the taxpayers and those of us who are FORCED to put that crap in our gas tanks. The way he ‘earned’ the money was by influence peddling, which I despise whether done by a dem or repub.
Newt was for that commercial before he was against it.
A ‘private citizen’ could not earn that kind of cash. Only a former Washington insider who could use his influence coulkd earn that kind of money. Newt is everything real ‘conservatives’ should despise about Washington DC.
Rick Perry Attacks Ethanol Subsidies in Iowa
http://news.yahoo.com/rick-perry-attacks-ethanol-subsidies-iowa-171700937.html
If he is willing to take that position while campaining in Iowa, he is serious about the stance.
It’s not called capitalism you moron. When the gov’t FORCES us to buy an inferior product, when the gov’t slaps a 50cent a gallon tariff on imported ethanol, and when the gov’t offers MASSIVE tax breaks to ethanol producers, what you get is more akin to the command economy of the USSR than free market capitalism.
I recommend you read Hayek’s The Road to Serfdom if you want to actually educate yourself on what a free market economy looks like and how when gov’t inserts itself in the conomy, bad things are bound to happen.
From his book “Fed Up! Our Fight To Save America From Washington” written before he was running from President:
7. Agricultural subsidies are just another form of wealth redistribution
The 11 craziest things in Rick Perry’s ‘Fed Up’ manifesto
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/09/15/the-11-craziest-things-in-rick-perrys-fed-up-manifesto/
“Obama: A New Wind in the White House” ...So THAT explains what I smell.
Thank God I’m not the only one! :)
Try to curb your enthusiasm for personal insults.
I understand that the government has insinuated its influence into our energy, food and manufacturing industries. Soft socialism and destructive.
What are your solutions to this entrenched status quo?
Taxpayers will not benefit if the subsidies are removed - we will be ‘punished’ with higher prices. Any savings will not be realized by reduced government spending - the ‘subsidies’ will be transferred to other programs.
We have been sucked into the swamp and the alligators are eating us - munching from the feet or the head - what’s the difference?
Are you working for Romney or Paul ?
Another sea of election trolls who are doing someone bidding here .
“I don’t have a problem with that.”
I don’t have a problem with Newt earning a buck. I have a problem with nominating a guy who would earn a buck off of organizations/policies that are synonymous with “big government”, and that’s Newt. At his heart, and now it is clear at his wallet, he is fundamentally a big government guy, and therefore unsuitable to be President.
At his core - and this is every bit as provocative as something Newt would say - but at his core, he is no different from Obama - he thinks government has an ever increasing role to play in peoples lives, and in the business those people do.
Newt = Obama
That about covers it.
It isn’t just the crap subsidized gas the government forces us to put in our tanks.
As a result of the ethanol mandate from the Feds (thanks Newt!) it has raised greatly the price of corn and distorted the worldwide food market over the past couple of years. Your basic grocery goods cost more because of this.
I love listening to Newt. Sounds great in the debates. But then you look at his actions and he really is a big government lobbyist. I don’t know how you can get away from it. Based now on what we’ve learned, I’d be more afraid of him than Romney to cut some crappy “deal” with the Dems if elected.
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