Yesterday, Jonah warned Newt Gingrich to restrain his “Newtness” — that is, his penchant for making grandiose statements. For instance, he recently told CNN that “because I am much like Reagan and Margaret Thatcher, I’m such an unconventional political figure that you really need to design a unique campaign that fits the way I operate and what I’m trying to do.”
But Joe McQuaid, publisher of the New Hampshire Union Leader, which endorsed Gingrich yesterday, tells National Review Online he likes the speaker’s style. And through his eyes, Gingrich resembles another world-historical figure: Winston Churchill. “Look at the broad history of the guy — when’s been in the wilderness, as Churchill was — and I don’t think that’s an inaccurate comparison at all,” he says.
Asked whether Gingrich’s propensity to think — and talk — big will get him in trouble, McQuaid replies, “I think he’s grown over the years. He doesn’t speak about it, but I think his conversion to Catholicism brought him down a peg or two.”
“He’ll still argue with you though,” McQuaid adds. During one of his three interviews with the paper this year, Gingrich tried to argue that his infamous “right-wing social engineering” comment wasn’t about Rep. Paul Ryan’s proposed budget. McQuaid remembers his response: “Yeah. Right.”
McQuaid thinks Gingrich’s out-of-the-box approach sets him apart. “Nobody thinks at that level,” he says. “They stay within whatever margin the pollsters and advisers have [given] them.”
“Gingrich doesn’t do that,” McQuaid maintains. “He goes off the deep end and throws things out there, and I think that’s what they need.” The publisher particularly enjoyed Gingrich’s contention at an event in Boston that public high schools should “get rid of high-priced unionized janitors and put the brooms in the hands of kids and get them to clean the school . . . not to save money but to teach kids about the ethic of work.”
What’s more, McQuaid appreciates Gingrich’s candor: “I liked his line that sitting on the couch with Pelosi was the stupidest thing he’s ever done.”
>>What’s more, McQuaid appreciates Gingrich’s candor: “I liked his line that sitting on the couch with Pelosi was the stupidest thing he’s ever done.”
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Newt did have a strong point with that comment although Newt's "stupidest...ever" is a high bar.
As stupid as Gingrich's past choices may have been, none are quite as bad as Romney's "abortion friendly" past.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseA candidate comparing one's self to Reagan or Thatcher would fall into the category of "over the top" whereas a candidate stating that their nomination would stop the seas from rising would be "grandiose" methinks...
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseNewt says some good things, but he benefits from comparison with his DC peers. As someone said recently, he's like the tallest building in Wichita. And (imo) not worthy to clean Churchill's paintbrushes.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseSaying that his Pelosi TV ad was stupid, acknowledges it was a dumb political move, but it doesn't repudiate his support for "global warming solutions."
The solution for the idea that man is warming the planet has always been a tax. Gingrich either knows this or he isn't as smart as he thinks it is.
CO2 is that natural byproduct of perfect combustion. Unlike sulfur dioxide emissions or nitrogen dioxide emissions, there is nothing you can do to reduce CO2 beside to stop burning.
Since many people cannot substainially reduce their electricity usage, they will be forced to pay the tax. Newt can phrase his "solution" in clever way, such as "cap & trade" or "market based exchange," but at the end of the day the government is artifically limiting your usage and then taxing you on the rest. It is still a tax.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI think you're missing the point. He sat on that couch BEFORE the Climategate emails.
As I've said in other threads, global warming isn't an ideological issue. The fact that legions of watermelons sign up because it gives them an excuse to control our economy does not show that everyone who is persuaded by it is a watermelon. Conservatives who won't accept a mea culpa from a fellow conservative are being every bit as irrational as the global warming mongers, by treating it as the same ideological litmus test--just from the opposite side. Not only is that a foolish ground for attacking a politician, it's also tacitly endorsing the political-hack's cooking of the books to persuade people of global warming.
If it's the answer that matters, and not the evidence, then you can't really complain when the other side does it, too, right?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseWhat. Is. Going. On?!?
Can we PLEASE stop with the hagiographies for a guy who is half a step to the right of Obama? Gingrich is NOT conservative, he is NOT a formidable challenger to Obama, and calling him "Churchill" merely serves three purposes:
1) to outright lie and slander poor, great Churchill;
2) to encourage conservatives incorrectly to put their guards down about Gingrich and not examine his many, many flaws (I see his flaws but no virtues) because, after all, he is "Churchill"!;
3) to utterly turn off independents, who see Gingrich rightly as the obnoxious man who was kicked out of national politics after becoming a countrywide embarrassment in the 1990s, only to serve as an oleaginous lobbyist for decades ... and not as a present-day Churchill.
Conservatives, wake up! Gingrich is a Trojan Horse. He's not conservative, and he'll lose us the election. Romney is infinitely better on either count, and we disgrace ourselves by pretending that Newt GIngrich of all people is either a conservative or a potential future POTUS.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI think you've "lionized" Churchill a bit too much. Churchill had a tendency to make grandiose statements that seemed foolish. Churchill was dismissed from politics as a failed embarassment. Churchill was far from a "Tea Party" style conservative, both in form and substance.
Now I think Gingrich is too liberal and has many faults. But seriously... Romney? Romney is (or was / will be, depending on the day of the week) further to the left than Gingrich on every issue. Romney has one big thing going for him: he is smoother and more palatable to the moderate middle, and thus is probably a safer bet against Obama. This notion that somehow Romney is the more CONSERVATIVE choice over any candidate (save Huntsman) is... silly.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseWow, you had me until your last line. I actually believed you were a (misguided) conservative, until you spoke up in favor of Romney. But never mind the fact that Romney is very obviously the media's and the Democrats' (but I repeat myself) choice in the Republican primary this year.
Newt Gingrich was the leader of the Conservative movement who actually balanced the budget. He also enacted welfare reform. And he did both over the top of a Democratic President. I could go on, but what's the point. I've been a fan of Newt's since at least '96, because he's the ONLY Republican who's been able to clearly articulate why conservative policies are American, and why (contempoarary) liberalism is not.
There are legitimate grounds for knocking Newt. But call him anything less than a geniune conservative, and you're talking yourself out of the conservative movement.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseMcQuaid has lost his mind.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseWhen I think about what made Reagan so prepared to be President- I think Gingrich has most closely resembled his model. Now please, I am not saying he is Reagan. Please hear me out.
Reagan spent a decade out of office making speeches and educating himself before winning the Presidency in 1980. Which candidate other then Gingrich has dedicated themselves to really researching issues over such a time span while not holding elected political office? No one that I can think of. Reagan's time out of office made him. That's Newt's appeal to me. Its clear that no one else outside of Santorum has spent a lot of time out of office truly educating themselves.
That's not to say that Newt doesn't take positions that are disagreeable. However I seem to remember a disagreement that WFB had w/Reagan over the Panama Canal and WFB still went on to support Reagan.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseChurchill?
You have got to be kidding...
Remember when the winds went sour in the polls over Iraq?
Remember Newt appearing on MSM outlets - one episode in particular to dump on the Bush Administration in the wake? He pulled another little Gingrich tantrum, slamming the Bush Administration, dumping on the admirable fight for liberty he pushed when it was expedient.
Hardly Churchillian, in any sense.
In fact, his debating Kerry over Global Warming was recently noted via Powerline and a savvy reader of Powerline, as one ceding of an issue after another.
Besides, Newt has never been in the "wilderness" after resigning in disgrace from the Speaker's position, as he even continues to graft off of the Washington Swamp today, including 1.8 Million via Fannie and Freddie.
The Union Leader shows again it's utter folly, as it did with McCain before - helping the Democratic Party with a terrible Beltway Insider who was bound to lose.
No wonder why newspaper circulations continue to tank, McQuaid is just another symbol of the dreadful sideline punditry offering, which continues to enable the worst in Our Government.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseNewt is the Tim Tebow of the political world. He isn't conventional, but he is a winner.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbusePlease do not insult Tim Tebow by comparing him to Gingrich.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseYou have to admit it's closer to the mark than Churchill.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseA winner? Based on what? He won his congressional district, of course, but that is hardly a microcosm of a Presidential election.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseIf you are talking about "The Contract with America," I think that may be one of the greatest myths in political history. It may -- may! -- have moved the national vote a point or so, but that election was already shaping up as a negative vote of confidence in Clinton, who had run as a Grover Cleveland, "New Kind of Democrat," only to make gays in the military and government-run healthcare his first priorities. He had also slowed down what had been an already improving economy by slapping it with tax increases that even he later said went too far.
The final nail in the coffin for the Democrats, though, was the House post office scandal, when it was discovered congressmen were using the post office to kite checks. It may not have been grandiose policy, but it was the kind of issue the average voter could understand in his or her guts. That single issue, in the context of the electorate's rapid disillusionment with Clinton, won the House for the GOP.
Newt claimed credit, of course, and was unable to check his ego or hubris. He acted like some kind of co-President and could not resist commenting on any subject raised in front of a television camera. Meanwhile, he mismanaged his new GOP majority and misread how far the old guard would be willing to go in pursuit of reform. When he came under attack for his book deal -- an attack I believe was purely partisan and unfair -- he found virtually no one willing to cover his back, because by then he had turned virtually everyone off.
It is also why he continues to carry some of the highest negatives of any political figure this side of Hillary Clinton. Maybe he would win and maybe he would not. But to back him because he is a "winner" is putting your faith in an awfully leaky vessel.
Gingrich has been off the deep end for years.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseTo me, Newt's the Jessie Jackson or Al Sharpton of the Republican party. He's not that bright, gives the impression that he's smarter than he is via his oratory, an embarrassment, morally and ethically bankrupt, a "do as I say and NOT as I do" 'er, but he's loud and gets attention.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseNewt has been and remains my second choice for the nomination behind Perry, although that has as much to do with the rest of the field as it has to do with Gingrich.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseBut "Gingrich resembles Churchill"????
Maybe in Newt's mind he resembles Churchill, since he's never been short on hubris, but until he shaves his head, begins smoking huge cigars, adapts a British accent and puts an entire country on his back and carries it through its darkest night, I think McQuaid must be convicted of either overkill or irrational exuberance.
Churchill was far more than just a man of ideas -- he was a man of action and fierce determination, who experienced real danger and exhibited true courage; both physically and morally. He was one of a half dozen or so genuine giants of the 20th century. Newt, by comparison, is more comparable to the college professor whose entire life has been spent in academia. He flits from one fascination to another, often oblivious to the contradictions they represent, because he is too taken by his own voice and the adoring looks his intellectual wanderings elicit from the unformed minds of star-struck co-eds to realize that he is speaking pure balderdash.
Perhaps in girth.
Newt isn't a strong candidate to face Obama. Newt will definitely pick a fight with the media as any good political pundit is bound to do but being a former FOX news commentator doesn't equal presidential material.
Also, Newt's weak organizational skills will not be a formidable force against a billion dollar negative campaign of Obama's.
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