Newt Gingrich is Not a Conservative (Pt. 18)
Writes Jim Geraghty at National Review:
The perception of Newt Gingrich as much quicker to compromise conservative principles than to ever admit a mistake comes heavily from Sen. Tom Coburn’s 2003 book Breach of Trust, which discusses his years in the House under Gingrich as Speaker, and paints a picture of Gingrich as a raging egomaniac, wildly hypocritical and quick to toss Class of 1994 principles.
Coburn offers this easily forgotten, but quite revealing, anecdote about a fight over increasing funding for House committees. The following is from Breach of Trust, pp. 73–76:
“When we filed in, it was immediately obvious that Newt Gingrich was furious. The meeting began with a roll call, and Gingrich said every Republican would be meeting in HC-5 in the basement of the Capitol even if he had to send the sergeant at arms — the police — to track members down…
When Gingrich said, “The eleven geniuses who thought they knew more than the rest of the Congress are going to come up and explain their votes,” someone leaned over to [then-Rep.] Mark Sanford and said, “I have never heard of anyone having to explain their vote.” Gingrich continued, “Those of you who had planned to go to John Kasich’s wedding on Saturday are not going. No one is going anywhere until we get the votes we need to pass this rule.”
. . . [Steve] Largent, an NFL Hall of Famer, went straight to the podium after [Dick] Armey finished speaking. A surprised Boehner recognized him. “Mr. Speaker,” Largent said calmly and directly to Gingrich who was no more than ten feet away, “I am not intimidated… I am not intimidated because I feel good about this vote and the principles behind it . . . Many of us were elected in 1994, and before that election we signed a document called the Contract with America. One of its pledges was to cut Washington committee funding by one third. We kept our word and did just that. Yet this proposal would reverse that cut. We owe it to those same folks to whom we pledged our word to either keep it, or go back to them and say, we’re new to the business of government. We cut too much and need to change our committee staffing numbers. Whatever we do, we shouldn’t do what was proposed today, which typified the Washington way of doing business so many came here to change — take credit for cutting by a third and then below the radar screen quietly add back the spending…”
Gingrich’s tactic backfired. He thought he could embarrass and intimidate us, but not one person was intimidated . . .
The event exposed a more disturbing trend that we all understood but weren’t ready to accept: the Republican “team” was no longer being held together by principles but by careerism and the desire for power for its own sake . . . Gingrich’s vitriolic response to us bringing down the rule for the bill confirmed to us he was willing to trade our principles for short term political advantage over the Democrats.”
Geraghty sarcastically adds:
Newt Gingrich, the conservative alternative.
The entire piece is worth your time not only to gain insight on how Gingrich is not conservative in any substantive sense, but also how he is as erratic and undisciplined as his critics maintain.
