I’ll avoid the “Well, he oughta know” lede and get straight to the charge.
At about the 15-minute mark of the interview, Gregory asked Abramoff – who finished a jail stint over a year ago on influence-peddling charges and has been promoting his recently-published book – about the strategic counseling fee of over $1 million that was paid to Newt Gingrich by housing giant Freddie Mac.
“What do you make of all that?” Gregory asked.
Abramoff replied, “This is exactly what I’m talking about. People who come to Washington who have public service and they cash in on it. And they use their public service and their access to make money, and unfortunatley Newt Gingrich is one of them who have done it. But far too many of them do it and one of the reforms I propose in my book is to close permanently the door, the revolving door, betweeen public service and cashing in as a lobbyist.”
He added after another question, “I don’t know if he’ll survive this, to be honest with you, this is a very big thing.”
“Why?” Gregory asked.
“Because he is doing, and engaging in the exact kind of corruption that America disdains. The very things that anger the Tea Party movement and the Occupy Wall Street movement and everybody who is not in a movement and watches washington and says why are these guys getting all this money, why do they all become so rich, why do they have these advantages? Unfortunately Newt seems to play right into it.”
It’s corrupt in the sense that almost every decision made in Washington made these days is corrupted by the nexus of money and power. As I said in an earlier post about this, though, from what we know the worst that can be said is that Gingrich fed at the federal trough. The same can be said about nearly every elected official in Washington.
That’s not to justify it. The fact is, Washington is a filthy place and a true conservative should get a pang of conscience for taking taxpayer dollars. But the other fact is, there are an awful lot of conservatives atop “Beltway bandit” companies that live off taxpayer dollars. This corruption is pretty much part of the system that existed long before Gingrich got elected to Congress.
Gingrich’s career can be roughly broken up into three phases: The early years, when he was the “guerrilla in the hills” leading the Republican minority in Congress; the middle period when he led the GOP revolution and became Speaker of the House; and the fall from grace to the present. The “guerrilla in the hills” Gingrich was brilliant, a staunch ally of Reagan in an era before we had Rush Limbaugh and Drudge and the rest of the right’s media to push back against liberal media and Democrat narratives. I grew up during this phase of Gingrich’s career and he was incredible, a fierce and articulate leader perfectly suited for his role and the times. He was indispensable. He was such an effective leader that he eventually led the way in taking control of Congress from the Democrats for the first time in a generation. That changed everything. It probably wouldn’t have happened without Gingrich’s fierce intellect, his ability to see beyond the horizon and his enormous drive to see his ideas carried out. As Speaker of the House Gingrich was at first effective, but as time went by the lobbyists wormed their way back in and Republicans became nearly as enamored of big government as the Democrats they overthrew had been. Gingrich’s undisciplined ways in life and politics started catching up with him. He fell from grace mostly as collateral damage from the Clinton scandals, hypocrisy dooming Gingrich more than Clinton’s own scandals ended up damaging him. The Gingrich phase from now to the present has been the source of most of his substantive problems. The couch ad with Pelosi, the Freddie Mac consultancy, the flirting with cap and trade, support for the individual mandate to purchase health insurance, all of that comes from the post-fall Gingrich.
That, to me, is the most substantive problem with the Freddie contract and everything else. It’s not the corruption, which is all too common and actually within the bounds of the law, it’s the exposure of what might be real changes in the way Gingrich thinks. Or, they’re tactical changes to repair his image. As he has gotten older, it’s fair to wonder whether he has actually gotten wiser or whether he has grown toward the left over the years in either a true ideological change or to reduce his popular unpopularity. Folks tend to forget that by the time he left the House, the mediaDemocrat machine had turned him into one of the most unpopular figures in America. The Clinton machine vilified him year after year without mercy or pity. He still had a following on the right, but nowhere else. His rehabilitation has taken the better part of a decade, during which time he had to make a living while he transformed himself into a less polarizing figure.
Now he atop some polls, which probably surprises him as much as it does anyone who has watched the arc of his career.
More: I meant to include this in the post but got distracted and forgot before publishing. We’ve seen several candidates rise and fall recently, always rising after joining the race or after a debate, then falling after a major hit in the media. The pattern suggests, to me, that Romney’s campaign is behind the attacks. Whether that’s the case or not, the pattern of Romney’s campaign press release is revealing of which candidate he actually fears the most. Romney sends out three basic kinds of releases — those that tout Romney, those that attack Obama, and those that attack Perry. That has been true for weeks, no matter who was rising or falling in the polls or where Perry happened to rank. Perry is fourth or fifth in some polls today while Gingrich is first or second, yet the only attack piece the Romney camp has sent out is an attack on…Perry.
That’s odd, on Hannity’s radio show one day last week he stated that Gingrich (as speaker) “did not do anything illegal” . He stated that Gingrich had big ideas of which he (Abramoff) could not pull him away from. I took to mean Gingrich did not fall for one of his schemes. Ok,I’m paraphrasing as best as I my memory will allow but there was not hint of impropriety about Gingrich.
Abramoff may have a very large axe to grind with not only Washington but most likely Republicans. Unless he’s willing to name names he’s just someone promoting his book.
Of course Abramoff has an axe to grind. He took the fall for Cheney and didn’t get sprung from the cooler.
Newt is toast. Perry is a notorious crony capitalist in Texas who is now pretending to be a reformer. Cain is likely innocent but he is in way over his head. Yo, Sarah! Time to step up. We need a proven leader who can take on both the corrupt media and the permanent political class. One with a record of sudden and relentless reform who won’t sell out. Mitt owns Obamacare. The elite love him way too much. Time to reload, baby.
Palin is anything but “a proven leader”. She is a dimwit, dysfunctional alaskan housewife- Mc Cain picked her to ensure his loss when his masters so directed.She is so dumb she told Obimbo that we have 57 states! And that his Pastor , when he says, “God damn America”, means that he is hostile to America. B. Hussein O never understood such to be the case, and always wondered why that phrase was used so frequently at the Flag Burning sessions he and his woman attended. Silly Billy Ayers tried to tell him, in public, but the big words on the teleprompter were just too much for hi, especially after four days of nothing but golf and vacation. Understandably, spending trillions of other peoples money can be tiring! And lying does, too, particularly if one lies while sitting, standing, walking, etc. But, to her credit, Sarah is not the one who showed Oscambo those sixteen ways to kill more babies and the seventeen ways to promote sodomy. That was Barney Frank and Nancy Pelosi- and just wait until the facts on their secret relationship some out!
Lessee, if you made your living racing cars, retire, and later, someone offers you a consulting gig to advise them about racing cars, is that corrupt?
Bryan has this just right. The real issue is whether Newt’s dalliances with unconservative thinking are a disqualifier (unless you are a moralist, in which case his personal life may be the big issue for you).
As far as I’m concerned, the Fannie Mae deal is next to nothing. Unless something comes out that proves Newt advised them to loan money to deadbeats, I’m believing what he says about it. The sit down with Nancy Pelosi is hardly more. Obviously, he was attempting to build bridges to the left and didn’t seem to realize she is an avowed anti-capitalist marxist. Not good, but at least somewhat understandable. At the time, it wasn’t clear to a lot of people what a scam AGW is. Again, not good that he accepted the trumped up claims of in-the-bag academics, but he was hardly alone. The Pelosi/global warming thing is something to consider, but hardly a strikeout.
I haven’t heard his explanation about the individual mandate thing. It sounds like the Heritage Foundation went along or perhaps was in the lead. More will come out on that soon enough. I want to hear what Newt says about it.
There’s no doubt he has wandered off Rush’s reservation more than once. Got it. Take a note. Newt isn’t perfect.
But there are only 8 candidates, and we have a war to win. That doesn’t mean it has to be Newt, but he sure has some useful ammunition in his holster, and it doesn’t look to me that Mr Perfect has cropped up yet.
– meet…Gregory?
If you’re going to disqualify Gingrich what are your options. Romney doesn’t have a conservative record. So the options would be Bachman, Cain, Perry or Santorum. Right now it looks like a two man race between Gringrich and Romney. I had hopes for Cain, I think he has good instincts, but it is absurd that he doesn’t have a strong position or a plan about collective bargaining reform for public workers.
Between Gingrich and Romney who do you think is going to roll back government expansion?
Gingrich is the most articulate, insightful and strategic candidate the GOP has. He stands head and shoulders above the others in his knowledge and ability to communicate the value of American exceptionalism, including its conservative tradition. No one else comes close.
In 2008, my preferred GOP candidate was Romney. Although also flawed in his conservative bona fides, appearing all too adaptable in working with liberals when he governed Massacheusetts, he was far better than McCain.
I’ll go with anybody but Obama, becasue the worst GOP candidate is night and day better than Obama.
But right now, I’m loving that Newt is getting a chance to shine, and I’d love to see him neuter Obama in a debate!!
Ooh, that is REALLY interesting about Romney….His method for “staying above the fray” is to actually CREATE the fray. Makes sense. He’s been running for President since at least 2004, and he must want it really, really bad.
I’m not in love with Romney as being The One Guy who best represents Republican thought and philosophy of this era, but I think Obama does it even worse. If we don’t go with Romney, I think we’ll get Obama Part Two, in which the USA dies a slow EPA-piloted death.
There are still too many voters who are just as likely to vote for a presidential candidate based upon the feelings they got from the most recent “adorable kitten” campaign ads as they are to vote based upon the candidate’s qualifications and beliefs.
Everyone – no matter how uninterested, uninformed, ignorant, misled, or mentally dazed – everyone has the right to vote for our government’s elective offices, and that’s how it should be, but if we could find a way to convince people that voting is important enough to justify at least fifteen minutes of prior studying, we’d all end up happier for it.
Until this happens, each of the non-Romney candidates have characteristics that make them too vulnerable to dumb-yet-effective knock-out smears and suggestions. They’d all too easily roll over to the kinds of evil marketing ploys that tend to persuade the no-mind “feelings” vote, and that demographic is always larger than you’d expect.
If we can get the Senate, and have Romney at least not vetoing what Obama would veto, we’re in a good position. If we run a Cain or a Perry or a Bachman or a Paul, they’ll get sunk by some past innocent remark or outrageous accusation or out-of-context position of a kind to which the more exposed candidates have already had to respond and repel.
Sadly, if we do run Romney, I think the Dems will come out with a truly vile anti-Mormon attack that shows an utter contempt for any and all religions, which will lead to the final complete break between religious and nonreligious communities. This would be such a foundational schism in our country that we’d be completely polarized by this one issue – and it’s an issue that people aren’t able to simply work past.
Harry Reid is a Mormon, so it should be easy to keep talking about him being a Mormon and never being attacked. They will use anything against anyone, whether it is true or not though. There are a lot of weird things to talk about in the LDS belief system though. I like Mormons, but just saying.
The occupy wall street protests’ main demand is to stop corporate influence in governemnt. Their current antics are distracting from Abramoff’s book release. If the protesters would focus on that book they could be making a useful statement instead of a counterproductive distraction and nuisance.
I am seeing a similar pattern of how the media has been protecting Obama, has also been true with Romney. Is Soros hedging his bet with Romney? The similarities between the protected media bubbles these two has been accorded is getting curiouser and curiouser!
Not buying it.
Newt is a damaged brand and Romney doesn’t have to do any dirty work…the propaganda machine will automatically attack anyone who is gaining any traction who is not a leftist.
Right now, Rick Perry is an also-ran.
And…I am in fantasyland thinking that the Stupid Party will do ANYTHING intelligent…but, my fantasyland does not include Sarah Palin running…because she is brand damaged beyond repair.
Paul Ryan is the answer. But, nobody seems interested in asking the right question. We are throwing away the opportunity to save the nation from overthrow. I am more firmly committed than ever to the Draft Paul Ryan movement.
He is the consensus candidate. He is the composite candidate. He is the undamaged brand candidate.
1)He is as articulate as Newt and is an idea guy…without being smug or pedantic.
2)He is likeable as Herman Cain, charming, …but not plastic like Huntsman.
3)He is attractive to independents and can capture those who want to leave Obama in droves.
4)He is a whiz on the budget and on the economy.
5)He is certainly capable of filling the Anybody but Romney shoes.
6)He can discuss foreign affairs with intelligence and savvy.
7)He is very likely to remember all the key departments that need an overhaul.
A Ryan/Rubio ticket would be nearly invincible. In the debates against Obama/Biden…there would no likely “cringe moments”…well, at least until Biden opened his mouth.
The propaganda machine could blow a few cogs and gaskets trying to come up with something…anything…to “brand damage” that ticket…but it would be short on ammo.
Ryan would not offend the Establishment Republican base, would not offend the Tea Party, would not offend the evangelists, would not offend the independents, would not offend the Reagan Democrats, the JFK older Catholic Democrats swing voters, the rust belt Clinton Republicans, …frankly….EVERY possible..potential…could be, maybe, kinda…someone who is not solidly in the leftist camp…is likely to take a long hard look at Ryan.
A Ryan/Rubio ticket can basically attract EVERY potential voter away from Obama.
NONE OF THE PRESENT CANDIDATES CAN DO THAT.
It is our best chance to save the country from overthrow. This cannot be about ego. It cannot be about becoming so invested in “my candidate or bust” mentality.
Rick Perry is a dead horse, we need to stop beating him. Herman has fallen and can’t get up. I’m not a clapper. Newt is a severely damaged brand.
We have two choices. Settle for Romney…or erase the blackboard and start over. I choose the latter. I’m not going away without at least a fight for saving this land of ours. Romney is settling for a lesser option. A weaker weapon. The lazy man’s surrender.
Ryan/Rubio is our best option. Everything else…is a risk I’m not willing to take.
hate to be the one to break it to you, cf, but Paul Ryan getting the nomination is also a fantasy.
But at least you have a good fantasy.
Politicians are pretty much all corrupt. Some say there must be something in the DC water; but, its the fact that even if honest men/women go to Washington they soon realize that they are exempt from our Republic’s laws and can do whatever they please. It has been this way for Centuries; but for the past half Century, the monies have become so over the top that even the most honest are soon corrupted–being a DC politician is a license to steal without fear of criminal punishment and who cares if they get bad mouthed when they have their pockets full of other peoples’ money and if a D they don’t even have to fear getting badmouthed as the LSM covers for them.