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The Spectacle Blog
Last week on my “Hillyer Time” radio show, my opening monologue
explained why I think it’s ludicrous to think Newt Gingrich could
possible win a general-election battle against Barack Obama -
analysis that stands regardless of whether one personally
likes the idea of Gingrich in the Oval Office if he should pull off
the miracle and win anyway. Some people wanted to be able to read
what I said.
So, slightly adapted from radio notes for reading ease, here’s what
I said:
Welcome to Hillyer Time….
For now, I really need to vent. I am absolutely flabbergasted at what I see in the latest Republican polls for president. What I see looks like a mass political suicide attempt — so determined to commit suicide that it uses too many pills, plus a slit wrist, plus a gun, on the ledge of a 1,000-foot building, just to make sure that at least one of the methods succeeds.
What I’m talking about is the rise of Newt Gingrich to the front of the Republican pack. If this isn’t mass suicide, is mass amnesia of a particularly dangerous variety. And, politically speaking, if it continues it will be an absolute guarantee of Barack Obama’s re-election next Fall.
Why? Well, for months I’ve said… … that Mitt Romney was the only legitimate contender the Republicans could choose who could NOT make a case against Obama’s biggest area of weakness, which is Obamacare, because Mitt Romney’s Massachusetts health plan was almost the exact model for Obamacare. It doesn’t matter how he spins it, Romney can’t make a cogent case against it.
But the reason I said Romney was the only one was because I didn’t consider Gingrich a legitimate contender. Well, if he is a serious contender, he becomes the second person who can’t make a case against Obamacare, especially against its individual mandate. Gingrich has supported an individual mandate for almost 18 years, has written in favor of it as recently as 2008, and even several times this year has defended it in concept.
So Gingrich can’t make a case against Obamacare.
He also can’t make the case against the liberals on the cause of the housing and banking crises. Why? Because he was selling out to Freddie Mac to the tune of more than a million dollars, and publicly advocating the Fannie Mae the whole time. He was on the wrong side of the system, the side that brought the system down.
So Gingrich can’t make the case against Obamacare or against Democratic housing policies. How about the case against all of the global warming alarmism and against corporate favoritism for ridiculous so-called green industries? Nope. Gingrich can’t make that case either. He was out there pushing ethanol mandates even after Al Gore himself had backed off ethanol, after the science proved that corn-based ethanol is in many ways more harmful than helpful. But none of that mattered, because Gingrich had sold himself to the ethanol industry as well, to the tune of more than 300 thousand dollars.
So take Obamacare and Freddie Mac and overregulation to fight globaloney for insider profits, take them all off the table. What’s left? How about making a real case for market-based entitlement reform?
Oops! Gingrich can’t do that. He blasted those reforms as,
quote, “right-wing social engineering.”
How about education reform, or how about ending racial
grievance-mongering? Oops, can’t do that: Gingrich toured with none
other than the vicious race-baiting felon Al Sharpton to push
dubious education policies.
Gingrich can’t make the case against Obama’s growing ethics problems: As Speaker, he was found liable for ethical violations and fined several hundred thousand dollars.
How about effective leadership? Well, the one time Gingrich was in real power, his own side tried a coup against him in just the third year, in mid-year, and then Gingrich imploded so badly in the fourth year that he was pushed out after near-disastrous election results.
How about attracting independents? Oops: Polls have shown for 15 years that Gingrich’s persona badly turns off independents.
How about enthusing Tea Party volunteers, so at least he can have a good grassroots effort? Oops: Tea Partiers don’t like him much either: Not only did he support the hugely expensive Medicare prescription drug program without insisting on other reforms, and not only did he spit all over Paul Ryan’s free-market Medicare reform plan, and not only did he end up supporting the TARP bailout, but he also nearly nipped the conservative grassroots movement in the bud by supporting ultra-liberal Republican DeDe Scozzafava in a special congressional election in New York over conservative favorite Doug Hoffman.
Gingrich also has supported partial amnesty for illegals, and at one time even supported the Fairness Doctrine that let government dictate broadcast content.
Even on foreign policy, Gingrich can’t make a coherent case that Obama will have any trouble exploding. In just a few weeks earlier this year, he shifted from being for military intervention in Libya to being against it, based entirely on which way the political winds seemed to be blowing.
And none of this even touches the megalomania of a man who used to write notes to himself describing himself as “definer of civilization, Teacher of the rules of civilization,” - those are direct quotes - and who also would refer to himself, in the presence of other people, as a, quote, “world historical figure.”
This is a man who, if he gets the Republican nomination, has less chance of defeating Barack Obama than the Tulane Green Wave football team would have this year of defeating the Alabama Crimson Tide.
The Gingrich surge is madness, sheer madness.
And don’t think for a minute that doing well in debates will make a difference. It’s easy to do well in debates when you are one of eight and none of the other eight is attacking you. Watch what happens when he gets offended in a two-way debate and loses his cool, snapping some snarly remark to Obama. It won’t work. And even if it does, it won’t matter much because debates will make less difference next fall than they seem to be doing now. Right now, almost nobody is advertising. Next year, Barack Obama will have $800 million to pour into an effort to define Gingrich in the public mind….
Or, rather, to reconfirm the definition of Gingrich that has prevailed for most of the past 16 years, which is that of a brilliant but disagreeable and somewhat smarmy, overwhelmingly cynical political operative.
Yes, folks, start putting the cyanide in the Kool-Aid - because that’s what millions of Republican voters will be drinking if they choose Newt Gingrich for their nominee.
So there. Never let it be said that we don’t lay it on the line, here in Hillyer Time.
View all comments (25) | Leave a comment
More Blog Posts by Quin Hillyer
http://spectator.org/blog/2011/11/22/my-radio-assessment-of-gingric
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florin| 11.22.11 @ 4:09PM
I don't want to keep jumping all over Gingrich but he really scares me...he is truly a megalomaniac and sees himself in such grandiose terms that nothing will stop him from mowing down conservative, honest, moral priciples if he is ever elected president. If power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely, we have much to fear if this man ever gets the highest office of the land. We've got to try to get Paul Ryan and other young Republican conservatives like him to run - for the good of the country.
Dan| 11.22.11 @ 7:43PM
Every guy who thinks he has what it takes to fill such a role has a bit of the meglomania about him. There's nothing strange about that.
Don't you think Reagan's plan of "we win, they lose" was grandiose? Go check out Peter Scwheizer's book about Reagan's secret plans to defeat and implode the Soviet Empire for some genuine grandiosity.
We NEED GRANDEUR right now, for our problems are of such an extent that they can only be tackled by plans equal to their measure.
As for Ryan, -------------------------- did you ever hear him speaking BEYOND the budget? Pure platitudes, nothing significant, nothing really substantive. Which means he understands the budget but not much more beyond that narrow topic.
We need a mind EQUAL to the multiple challenges and tasks before us.
There are only two men in our party equal to the task, and both of 'em have a bit of that which you deplore about them.
One is Giuliani.
The other is Gingrich.
And both have brains like tempered razors.
Rick V.| 11.22.11 @ 4:53PM
Honestly, I'm beginning to agree with Pat Caddell - if Obama cares at all about our country and/or the Democratic party (granted, two big "ifs"), he'll drop his campaign for re-election and turn the reins over to Hillary. Frankly, Gingrich scares me less than Romney, but I think the best we can pray for is a Republican majority in the House and Senate. The Republican presidential candidates will implode and Obama successfully scares the phony "99%" - consisting of Seniors, minorities, college kids and the unemployed - into voting for him.
Dan| 11.22.11 @ 7:39PM
But he doesn't care, and he never did.
You just wait to he spills the details of his relationship with Reggie Love, just to ram it down Uncle Sam's throat just how much derision and hate he feels for this country.
It's ALL going to come out, and it isn't going to be pretty.
Kingofthenet| 11.22.11 @ 5:22PM
My handicapping has it:
Romney 50/50 chance of winning the General
Gingrich: 0% chance
Perry 20%
Cain 10%
Ron Paul 30%
Everyone else less than 10%
Dai Alanye | 11.22.11 @ 6:09PM
There you go again, Quin, making the mistake of assuming voters to be rational rather than largely emotional. True, Gingrich is almost as narcissistic as Obama - almost. True, Gingrich has been all over the map in his policy views, and has too often seemed to act from desire for personal publicity than deeply-help philosophy. And true, anti-Newt ads can do him some harm.
OTOH, he is extremely adroit in debate, and debates have been significant factors in recent elections. Better responses by Bush I against Clinton, and by McCain against Obama would have made significant differences in the outcomes of '92 and '08. Without his teleprompter we can expect Obama will struggle.
Further, Gingrich seems to have done an unusually good job lately of connecting with the base through his appeals to hard-nosed self-interest and his rebukes to the news media. His main attraction for me and many others is, however, the fact he isn't Romney.
All those logical reasons you gave for doubting Gingrich don't count for much. If we were logical rather than largely emotional in our choices, if we chose our leader for knowledge and skill in governance rather than likability, Santorum would the leading the polls.
Dan| 11.22.11 @ 7:36PM
Santorum is Catholic.
He never had a prayer for gaining the Republican nomination. There are VAST numbers of Protestants who truly buy into that whole Scarlet Whore of Babylon bit, and they have twisted themselves into knots convincing themselves that Rome, the city of the Seven Hills, fits the bill to a T.
And those Protestants vote, and they vote in vast numbers in the Republican primary.
Those who believe that such a base will reconcile themselves to the Mormon just because he'll supposedly be the one NOT Obama in the general little understand their religious fervour, and little understand their twisted and errant theology.
If we go with the Mormon we'll be staring down both barrels of a loaded shotgun.
And it isn't going to end well.
Jarrett, Axelrod, et al, they've ALREADY FOCUS GROUPED their attack plans, and they're fully intending to make Mormonism look like a creed styled precisely for white people, and nothing but white people. Sure Mormons have made outreach in the recent decades to others, ----------- but rest assured Obama intends to target Mormonism.
Do Democrats care about tossing away the vote of Mormons? Do they care about tossing away Utah and maybe Nevada's Electoral college votes?
This is going to be the most wicked reelection campaign in American history.
Brendan| 11.22.11 @ 11:37PM
I'm Catholic - but I think Santorum sounds like a whiner. I'd vote for him (I made my mistake with Perot, and its up to you folks here at the Spec to remind folks how dumb that move was....) but he's low on my list.
On the other hand, I am sad to say that there are a lot of born agains who will not vote for a Morman. I've got two friends who swear up and down that they never will. Catholics are at least considered "Christian" by these types, if not misguided. Mormans are considered to have a religion founded by satan (or something like that).
I am surprised at the anti newt thread here. Newt battled for conservatives in the 90s. Yes, he did some dumb things. Every politician does dumb things. I'm sure if we tried, we could name a bunch Reagan did. But Quinn remembers them a lot better than most will.
The news media will rip apart whomever our nominee may be. I think the only defense is having someone who has the guts to fight and the brains to do so. As I recall, McCain had neither.
I think Romney has Brains. I don't think he will fight. Against Chicago politics, that is a looser.
That said, I will vote for him, or anyone else who gets the nomination. And everyone else should too. Unless you hate this country. Sorry - we are that close to dissolution. I know folks who think it will be exciting when the cities fall to barbarism, but I have two small children, and I don't want them to have to grow up in a world falling into barbarism. Obama will lead the way on that, so put your pride aside and lets try to save the last best hope for mankind. and keep that light on the hill shining. Only a republican president can do that at this time. We are that close....
Dan| 11.22.11 @ 7:29PM
Yea, let's reject the guy with brains and "baggage," because the media will go after him.
Instead, let's go with the guy that can't exceed 25% in the Republican field, and couldn't exceed that number last time. Let's go with the guy that the media isn't zeroing in on, as they have Cain, Gingrich and Perry.
Let's go with the guy that the media is precisely giving a pass too during the primary, so they might unload all over him and on him during the general.
Let's go with the guy who will be asked to explain and justify every single heretical and odd religious belief and practice of Mormonism, from the moment it was dreamed up till this very day. Let's go with the guy that the media AND the Obama campaign, {WE KNOW because they themselves told us...} already intend to portray as "weird."
Let's go with the guy that the Democrats will be able to use the EXACT same ads that the Republicans used against Kerry, as being a flip-flopper. Yea, won't that make us all look just so principled, barely a decade after ridiculing Kerry as a flopper and flipper, we'll go with Romney who makes Kerry look sane and steady in comparison.
In six months the nation will have reached it's breaking point politically, after the economic carnage Obama is visiting upon the nation. This is the time for the guy MOST ABLE in the field to articulate and explain conservative tenets.
This IS Gingrich's time.
Jon B| 11.22.11 @ 8:03PM
Gingrich, if you recall, spent $30 billion more than Clinton asked for and increased spending in every program he promised toi cut in the "contract" with America. No? Google GOP pussycats by Edward Crane, former President of the CATO Intsitute. Newt's a big spender, an adulterer, and a bald faced liar.
Jon B| 11.22.11 @ 8:04PM
From the article... "Over the past three years the Republican-controlled Congress has approved discretionary spending that exceeded Bill Clinton's requests by more than $30 billion. The party that in 1994 would abolish the Department of Education now brags in response to Clinton's 2000 State of the Union Address that it is outspending the White House when it comes to education. My colleagues Stephen Moore and Stephen Slivinski found that the combined budgets of the 95 major programs that the Contract with America promised to eliminate have increased by 13%"
Katt| 11.22.11 @ 8:10PM
Don't get your panties in a twist. There are over 10 months left...the landscape in the summer is going to be completely different. Just several months ago, it was all about Herman Cain. Newt is not going to last.
trumpman| 11.22.11 @ 8:58PM
re: "Never let it be said that we don't lay it on the line, here in Hillyer Time."
Well Mr. Hillyer, let me tell it like it is. America has already committed suicide by allowing Obama to continue illegally in office - he is NOT a natural born citizen; not born of 2 U.S. citizen parents. Moreover all civil servants and elected officials who have sworn to protect and defend the Constitution is by their cover-up in violation of their oath. Meanwhile, the media remains mute and pundits ponder who would be Obama's best debate candidates...
ref: http://www.patriotsunion.org/P.....ations.htm
teflon93| 11.23.11 @ 7:53AM
Gingrich's role in "The Contract with America" and taking back the House (a feat not accomplished for a half-century before he did it) was a far greater service Gingrich did to conservatism than Mitt Romney has ever done in his life.
Romney the trust fund baby and corporate hatchetman---and of the religion which wouldn't allow a black man to be ordained until 1978!---has ZERO chance against Obama. Moreover, if Romney did somehow win, there would be precisely zero chance of him governing to the right of George W. Bush, who famously proclaimed "the conservative movement is dead."
I personally won't vote for Gingrich. I won't vote for Romney. The furthest left I will go in this field is Rick Perry, because anyone to the left of him simply will not solve this country's debt crisis.
But make no doubt about it: Newt Gingrich is the second coming of Reagan to Romney's Jimmuh Carter.
Brendan| 11.23.11 @ 9:34AM
Then you want the country to fail? To descend into chaos?
That is not a position of someone who loves his country or his fellow Americans. We have a pretty decent slate - yes, even Huntsman would be better than The One. If you don't like this slate, work to make the house and senate more conservative. We didn't loose this country in a day, and we won't fix it in a day.
Grow up.
Silver Bullet| 11.23.11 @ 8:20AM
Quin, thank you for the cold water! I can just picture Obama's $800-million stash advertising the details of your column -- because these are, truly, the facts of the matter; and they don't look good for Newt!
Really, what are we going to do? Every one of the candidates seems to come with a dose of cyanide. Gingrich with multiple doses, based on your column. Perry -- tongue-tied. Cain -- not knowledgeable about Libya, and potentially with another "shoe" to drop, in October of 2012, on these "bimbo" eruptions. Huntsman -- RINO. Bachmann -- flighty, going berserk over Gardasil. Paul -- bizarrely still blaming us for 9/11 attacks -- you just can't ignore this blind spot he has. Romney -- Romney-care. Santorum -- a bit of a whiner during debates; still excoriated for his support of Specter, and doubts about losing re-election bid.
My own favorite used to be Santorum, because -- like him -- I find that the denigrated social issues are, truly, of paramount importance. One might even reasonably argue that our economic woes -- as well as those of Europe -- are due to a birth dearth; and that if we have a "problem" with immigration, it's because we've "imported the babies we aborted." But is Santorum electable? Can he even get the nomination?
I just don't know any longer.
Brendan| 11.23.11 @ 9:40AM
Yes you do. Obama is a clear and present danger to the future of the republic. You're sounding like Santorum in the prior debates - whiny (which is why he is down there with Huntsman... if he had been like he was last night, he would be much higher...). Man up and vote. Work at your local level for great congressmen. Work at getting better Senators. Conservatives have been on "glide" for too long. We got in a hissy fit in 2006 and voted out our guys, instead of gutting them in the primaries and show that we can police our own. This is a mess that we helped to build, and sitting on our hands will only make it worse.
Silver Bullet| 11.23.11 @ 4:33PM
Give it a break, will ya? I do my part, including participation in this forum. Do you do yours? When you say "we got in a hissy fit in 2006"? When you say "a mess that we helped to build"? Maybe YOU did; but I most certainly didn't participate in your glib "we."
And, so, then, I take it that -- like me -- you've given $$$ to Santorum; given him legitimately critical advice on these forums; talked him up among friends & family.... etc. Hmm??
I haven't "sat on my hands." Maybe you have!
YOU, Brendan -- get off your hands and tell me whom YOU have worked for.
Brendan| 11.23.11 @ 8:34PM
Well that was wasted money.
I work for my family. I don't have the extra money to send (we have been in the red for the last few years, and only recently have I pulled positive), When my kids are older, I'll consider "working' for a politician. But I always vote.
Brendan| 11.23.11 @ 9:05PM
I should be nicer. Sorry. Its obvious that you have a lot at stake in this. But my point stands. I should know. I live in California. I have seen up close what the govt out of control can do (part of my work sent several regulators to jail in the 90s - and I'm not law enforcement. California isn't even close to the marxist hell that the national demonrats have in store for us. My wife, an eastern european, tells me that she is seeing us GO to socialism. I predicted something similar to the Occupiers a year ago, and God help us if the rest of my thoughts come to pass (Steyn is making a lot of money with that scenario). All we can do is vote for the best that comes out of this.
Once again, sorry. We are all on the same side here.
Angelo Reyes| 11.23.11 @ 10:09AM
So this is what passes for analysis where you are? Some of us have seen what amatuer in the WH has cost us. Nobodies going to accuse Newt of being an amateur. Newt is the only candidate (inlcuding Obama) who doesn;'t "fake answers. People will look at Newt (and Romney) and see a man theyy can entrust with the power of the presidency. Especially compared to this joke we have in the WH at present. The difference between Newt and Romney, is that Newt will change things, while Romney will manage, as best he can, what we've already got.
Jeff Perren| 11.23.11 @ 11:41AM
Voters haven't paid close attention to politics for decades (with brief exceptions). (That's a major reason we are in the fix we are in.)
So, the overwhelming majority won't care much how Gingrich was vilified 16 years ago, only about his perceived persona now. So far, that's looking pretty good.
As for making a snarly remark in a two-man debate against Obama... why do you think that would be seen as a negative? Gingrich would act as a proxy for the majority - right, left, or 'independent' - who are pretty pissed at the guy now.
Oldefarte| 11.23.11 @ 5:34PM
Quin is absolutely correct about Newt's baggage. He would do well debate-wise against El Chosen One, but so what? As Perry appropriately states, we already have a debate king running the country into the ground. The probable best indication of capability [or indicative of what each would do as president] is the candidate's job history as administrator/manager, and the only two with same are Perry and Romney. As the old saying goes, IT'S ACTIONS THAT COUNT, NOT WORDS!!!!!!!!!!!
Tejanojack| 11.24.11 @ 11:00AM
I was sitting in my livingroom chair. I saw his mouth move. I heard the words. But instantly I was in a parallel universe. I had just mailed a hefty monthly donation to Newt and now I was watching it whirling threw the "S"-trap in the commode.
Uuugh! I knew he'd do it again, but I was praying he wouldn't. Newt always plays it cool for awhile, then when he thinks he's riding high, he lets his ego get the better of him and he waxes "egghead" on me.
Newt!!!! Dumb, dumb, dumb! You need to hire some guys out hear in the real world, so they can hold your hand or your tongue. Your timing and choice of place could not have been worse. The only folks, who abide any whiff of amnesty, are Democrats. This is the Republican Primary with right wing Iowa staring you in the eye. Where was your head? Moreover, you keep digging the hole deeper. Shut - Up!
Sweet Geeezus, I hate the thought of voting for Romney next November. Tejano Jack
Abigail| 12.1.11 @ 10:15AM
I was on board the Gingrich train but this piece has seriously caused me to rethink my support.
I guess Romney is the inevitable choice here.