Nancy Pelosi today told a liberal blog that “when the time is right” she will reveal damaging information about Newt Gingrich. She said she would use information against him that she learned while she was a member of the House committee that investigated and eventually fined him in 1997.
Gingrich fired back, essentially, “Make my day, Madame Botox.” That’s not an exact quote but it captures the spirit.
Gingrich noted that according to House rules, Pelosi can’t reveal anything she learned from that committee work. His response seems to have struck a nerve, because Pelosi quickly trotted our her spokesman to lie about what she really meant.
But responding to Gingrich’s comments, a spokesman for Pelosi said the former Speaker was “clearly referring to the extensive amount of information that is in the public record, including the comprehensive committee report with which the public may not be fully aware.”
No, she clearly was not referring to anything that’s in the public record. If it was in the public record, Pelosi wouldn’t have to reveal it “when the time is right.” It would already be…in the public record. Duh. Pelosi and her spokesman think we’re stupid.
But here’s what Pelosi has done. For the duration of the election, Newt Gingrich can respond to any and all attacks on him as if they originate from Nancy Pelosi. So any hit on him from any direction can now get focused back on the person that many Republicans regard as the most toxic member of Congress. Whenever he comes under attack, Newt Gingrich may be able to get Republicans to rally around him just for the sake of undoing anything Pelosi may be up to. She also helped him frame those 1997 charges as more political than they really were. Pelosi’s foolish threat may amount to a Get Out of Ethical Jail Free card for Newt Gingrich.
Nevermind the fact that in order to hit Gingrich, Pelosi first has to get her projectiles past her own glass ethical house.
Merely “Googling” Newt and House Ethics Committee returns about 6 gazillion hits, so no one should be surprised about any of this ever. Anything beyond the public record, however, should earn Pelosi an expulsion from the House. Yeah, I know, fat chance, but one can always dream.
“Nancy Pelosi Brings Knife to Gunfight with Gingrich”
Sometimes the literal is much preferable to the metaphorical.
This is an example of why Gingrich just may be the guy, despite the baggage.
Would Romney respond like this?
I’ve been predicting that Pravda would only ask Newt once about some incident in his extensive history, because Newt would immediately begin talking about Bill Ayers, Rev Wright, Rezko, etc. With this notch on his belt, they may never dare to ask even once.
Of course, there will still be plenty of opportunities to float the lies and innuendos. The key point is that Newt won’t do the republican trick of shriveling into a fetal position and begging not to be kicked again.
I’m more concerned about what Newt will say when Obama reminds us that Newt endorsed Cap and Trade, something that not even Democrat majorities in the House and Senate could pass.
Seems as if Newt has changed his view about AGW. Do you really think that will tongue-tie him if Obama asks him about it?
“Newt absolutely opposes “cap and trade” as well as any system of taxing carbon emissions. He testified before Congress against it in 2009 and led a grassroots effort while the Chairman of American Solutions to block its passage in the House and Senate.”
http://www.newt.org/answers#GlobalWarming
You can read the Feb 2007 interview that the Paulista’s are referencing here:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/hotpolitics/interviews/gingrich.html
Has anyone else changed their minds since 2000 and Feb 2007. George Bush would be in that group.
Romney is as well:
“My view is that we don’t know what’s causing climate change on this planet,” Romney said in the speech, a clip of which was posted by the liberal blog Think Progress. “And the idea of spending trillions and trillions of dollars to try to reduce CO2 emissions is not the right course for us.”
http://www.boston.com/Boston/politicalintelligence/2011/10/romney-makes-new-shift-global-warming-position/aBMsQrPwV3bxnFZHLRNPwO/index.html
Great, so you are showing Gingrich has a history of being wrong. Great credentials for a prez.
“Has anyone else changed their minds since 2000 and Feb 2007. George Bush would be in that group.”
And now you are invoking that great President Bush to compare him to. Not exactly the measuring stick most of us want. Might need to aim higher my friend.
Or, you could choose the the one who has been consistent for the last 30 years. The one that realizes that the Constitution is our king and the Fed can only do what it explicitly has been granted powers to do. Time for us all to vote for and support Ron Paul.
ROFLMAO
I see the moonbats..excuse me, Paulbots…are migrating again.
It’s easy to be principled when you are responsible for nothing. Frankly, the guy doesn’t appear that bright – he has his libertarian talking points down but can’t seem to be able to think past them when they don’t apply. It makes him sound a bit loopy and out of touch, especially on foreign policy. And he’s probably more of an anti-semite than the current President. We need a strong supporter of Israel in the coming few years, and Gingrich is absolutely there.
Thanks for presenting an argument rather than just conceding by name-calling. I support Israel as well as a I am a Christian. I just don’t see where in the Constitution gives us the right as a nation to meddle. You would be stretching it to say it is national defense which I believe is the government’s primary responsibility.
Also, aren’t we as conservative always stating to liberal groups that want more taxes (or more green energy, etc..) saying “fine, pay more taxes.” So, if I want to support Israel, to be consistent, shouldn’t I reach into my own pocket and “support Israel?”
IMHO, Gringrich is a re-tread of big government policy makers. I’ve had enough of them.
The stormtroofers are crawling out from under the rocks already, eh?
Great, so you are showing Gingrich has a history of being wrong. Great credentials for a prez.
If you’re looking for human perfection, the last one died on the cross about 2000 years ago. People make mistakes. Smart people learn from them. Wise people learn from the mistakes of others but wisdom is very rare in politics.
I’d rather have someone who can admit they were wrong about something than someone like Obama who could never do so.
I’ve heard it said “wise people learn from others mistakes, average people learn from their own mistakes and a fool learns from neither.” I think that is pretty true. If Gringrich is sincere, rather than just backtracking because it is politically expedient, then he is average.Wouldn’t you rather have someone who has been right on the climate science and healthcare and bailout from the beginning?
Obviously no one is perfect but to be wrong on so many key issue has raised a red flag for me. He might be good at one-liners and zingers… seems more appropriate that he would take over for Leno than for Obama.
Also: Obama isn’t a viable option as we both know. Certainly I would take any GOPer over him.
Franky, I don’t care what the topic is.
People who castigate others for changing postitions are hypocrites, at best.
I’d like to hear from a commenter who has held the exact same view on ANY COMPLEX TOPIC for 20 years. I’m not talking about things like faith or bedrock principles like honesty or loyalty, I’m talking about complex solutions to problems and situations that can’t be crystalized in a sentence or two.
Speak up now people. This is your chance to demonstrate what a snowflake conservative you are.
There’s an easy ‘out’ for Newt on Cap n Trade. He could say, with cast iron credibility, that that was then, in the 90s, when the economy was growing fast, the stock market was booming, unemployment was low and the Federal Government even had a budget surplus. Not now, not anymore, after Obama’s slash-and-burn ideology and his crony capitalism. As for renewable energy, he’s still in favour, only such companies would receive no taxpayer largesse and would have to sink or swim as genuine free market companies, like evrybody else. No more Solyndras.
How does Obama or Pelosi handle that? Not a hope in hell.
– Rep. Issa issuing subpoenas to those involved in the S.F. Machine?
Nancy Pelosi is an embarrassment to the United States House of Representatives, to California, to Baltimore (the city of her birth), to Italian-Americans and to anything and everyone associated with her.
That she — as Bryan says — from her glass house thinks she, of all people, can destroy Newt, she’s dumber than she looks in PJM’s superb collection of photographs of her.
Rather than destroying Newt, she should concentrate her massive intellectual powers on suing her plastic surgeon, who has placed her eyebrows in a permanent expression of shock and dismay.
He may just be a closet Republican.
What she has done, though, is to introduce the idea that there is information *beyond* what is in the public record, thus keeping a permanent question about Gingrich’s character that cannot be addressed & put to rest, because it’s, you know, tucked away in a congressional record that can’t be divulged to the public. It’s the gift that keeps on giving.
There’s the public record, and then there are “leaks.” So she’ll try it anyway, and it’ll just boomerang and hit her upside the head.
When Nancy tries her leaks, I’m sure Newt and the Republicans have more than a few things to throw back in her face like the sweatheart deals for her family members. Even “60 Minutes” has brought up that topic. Queen Nancy is corrpt as hell and she invites a lot of blowback.
Excellent analysis, Mr. Preston.
It is that Newt fires back, rather than cowering, as proreason (#3) noted.
As Tucci (#6) noted, she doesn’t have the standing she thinks she does. Imagine Newt saying, “This from the woman who made a killing in the market by killing the Visa bill?”
I disagree with Darkwater (#7), because she is the wrong messenger. She is viewed as worse, so he can always redirect the argument back onto her and her failings. A quick transition from defense to offense is the most powerful of attacks, and the best defense is a good offense.
To Marc Malone, & Taxpayer & Larry J as well, you all agree that Pelosi is the wrong messenger — as I certainly do — but while we dismiss what she says (& rightly so, for so many reasons), there are others in her camp that are invigorated by this conspiritorial idea: there is something locked away that is tantalisingly vicious about Gingrich, & they can salivate about it as long as she doesn’t have a press conference to announce that the vault is empty & she was wrong (not likely). Just running the idea up the flagpole (even if there’s no flag) is enough.
I expect that Oliver Stone is already working on a script.
Does Nancy have to worry? Absolutely not — San Francisco will vote for her even if she were the devil incarnate (or maybe because they think she already is).
Newt has enough personal baggage in the public domain to keep him busy enough as it is, but the notion that there is Something Else will be a font of material for the Left punditry. This stuff always sells. (The previous rule does not apply if the MSM is speaking of Bill Clinton, John Edwards, or the like.)
The most despised politician in America, trying to sound relevant.
I think the Democrats are having a major panic attack at just the thought of an Obama vs Gingrich debate. The DNC doesn’t want it revealed in prime time that Obama isn’t that bright.
Newt is not afraid to call Obama out on anything that many other candidates won’t touch.
Newt will bring up things at a debate that the lapdog moderators refuse to ask Obama.
I long to see Obama hammered in a debate. To see him stammering and stuttering and getting testy. McCain refused to get tough w/BO.
Newt will go there.
… the Democrats AND the Main Stream Media are having a major panic attack .. but otherwise an excellent comment!
The “got rich on inside information” Ninny, er Nancy, is going to shovel some dirt when the time is right? Tsk, tsk, Nancy, go ahead and do what you have promised. You have no credibility and even less of an audience.
Newt, you must be making the Obamanation nervous for the Wicked Witch of the West to personally take a shot at you. Keep up the good work!!
me, I think this is going to backfire on Princess Nancy. Americans don’t like tattle-tales or blackmailers. I don’t know why the Democrats think this is ok behavior. imagine John Boehner or Eric Cantor ever saying anything like this!
It’s so nice to see that the “Politics of Personal Destruction” are dead .. and reborn again on the third day. I guess it a “junk-food Catholic” thing.
We need a fighter, not a lover, and Newt fills that bill. Each election has a different gestalt and requires a different candidate to achieve victory. But BO makes our candidate issue easy: we’ll take anyone who can and will beat him. I like Newt’s scrappy side for this.
Looks like “Two Gun Nancy” has managed to shoot herself in both manicured feet. If Pelosi does reveal what she allegedly knows, she’s setting herself up for The Mother of All House Ethics Complaints. If Nancy doesn’t spill the beans, then Newt calls her bluff and confirms, beyond reasonable doubt, that Nancy is the drooling idiot that we all knew to be anyway.
Newt must be doing his best “River Dance Jig” right now.
In the general, this will be BO vs. Clintons (Newt) Part II.
>> She also helped him frame those 1997 charges as more political than they really were.
More political than they really were? They were really, really political so that’s a tall order. Sounds like she helped him frame the charges AS political as they really were. Oh I forgot, we routinely criminalize policy differences now.
– did was it a scalpel?
Newt has so much baggage, but yet, I find him refreshing. Why is that? Because he responds to the left like I WOULD!!!! So many americans have been WAITING for someone like this. I’m not sure what Mitt has been doing, and I would never say anything negative about him, but a lot of us are waiting for some strong language against Obama.
It’s Gingrich Time!
All things come to those who wait and now it’s Gingrich’s turn. With the race for the Republican nomination for president seemingly narrowed to a pack of two, Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich, it was time for the Obama attack team to zero in on Newt since he has been waxing of late and Mitt has been stagnating.
Adhering to the military strategy of focusing on offing the leader, the Obamians have been dismantling the front runner until he is beaten to a pulp then deal with the remnants of the field. It worked with Bachmann, Perry, and Cain so why not go with whatever works?
Of course, even when he was bringing up the rear, Gingrich received his allotted share of undercutting but it’s a whole new ballgame now that he’s in the lead. The Big Guns are being trotted out to reduce him to size, if not to a quivering shadow of his former self.
However, with all his faults and baggage, Newt represents a lot of candidate to cut down and he’s not known to quiver much.
And, to utilize a tempting pun, his quiver is chock-full of arrows with which to bring down Obama, chiefly his knowledge, experience, intelligence, and debating expertise, all of which constitute fearsome forces to reckon with and the re-elect Obama team has evidently been doing a great deal of reckoning.
The latest Democrat stalwart to join the Democrat attack machine isn’t known for her intelligence or expertise in anything other than winning her own re-election in a super-safe congressional district and just launched her initial salvo of innuendo intended to inflict damage on her former House colleague.
House Minority Leader Rep. Nancy Pelosi didn’t really say anything of substance to Talking Points Memo but rather, in her sly fashion, tried to smear and intimidate Gingrich with a threat.
As she inelegantly put it without elaboration, “When the time is right. . . I know a lot about him. I served on the investigative committee that investigated him, four of us locked in a room in an undisclosed location for a year. A thousand pages of his stuff.”
Just think about it. An investigative committee of four so far un-identified individuals investigating an arch political enemy for twelve months behind non-transparent doors and compiling “a thousand pages of his stuff.” It’s a wonder they didn’t find Newt guilty of pulling grandma’s plug and tossing babies into wood chippers!
Imagine any committee secretly investigating Barack Hussein Obama for a year! They could determine he was born in Nairobi, his father was a confirmed Marxist drunk, and his mother had this peculiar thing for Muslim men. . .
(Read more at http://www.genelalor.com/blog1/?p=9629.)
Newt’s famously wide-ranging but somewhat undisciplined thinking process obviously serves well in the sort of consulting role he has been in. It could be a problem in the Presidency, but I suspect there would be enough smart people around him to provide feedback and keep things on target, provided he has the necessary humility. Reagan is a good model in that respect: a very smart man who listened to others.
“Pelosi and her spokesman think we’re stupid.”
Given the amount of power the nation gave her to wield and the way we allowed her to wield it I’d say her belief is well-founded.
Interesting findings … check it out 1. Back in 1961 people of color were
called ‘Negroes.’ So how can the Obama ‘birth certificate’ state he is
‘African-American’ when the term wasn’t even used back then? 2. The birth
certificate that the White House released lists Obama’s birth as August 4,
1961. It also lists Barack Hussein Obama as his father. No big deal,
right? At the time of Obama’s birth, it also shows that his father is aged
25 years old, and that Obama’s father was born in “Kenya , East Africa “.
This wouldn’t seem like anything of concern, except the fact that Kenya
did not even exist until 1963, two whole years after Obama’s birth, and
27 years after his father’s birth. How could Obama’s father have been born
in a country that did not yet exist? Up and until Kenya was formed in
1963, it was known as the British East Africa Protectorate”. 3. On the
birth certificate released by the White House, the listed place of birth
is “Kapi’olani Maternity & Gynecological Hospital”. This cannot be,
because the hospital(s) in question in 1961 were called “KauiKeolani
Children’s Hospital” and “Kapi’olani Maternity Home”, respectively. The
name did not change to Kapi’olani Maternity & Gynecological Hospital until
1978, when these two hospitals merged. How can this particular name of the
hospital be on a birth certificate dated 1961 if this name had not yet
been applied to it until 1978?
Watch out. The liberals are defending Pelosi. They have released the old Ethics Committee Report that showed Gingrich actually defended himself against the original charges. They are also over-emphasizing the fact that he was the House Speaker in history to reprimanded by the House. Here’s what Newt did: He taught a class sponsored by a 501(c)3 which had some relationship to GOPAC. When inquiries were initiated (which were part of the Clinton impeachment vengeance) about whether this class was partisan, he originally said it wasn’t. Supposedly he later testified that it was part of a larger GOP recruiting effort.
It was in a GOP controlled House by a GOP controlled Ethics Committee.