Our #1 story explains why the Republican establishment is against Gingrich. #2 is a meme on why Gingrich isn’t a strong candidate. #3 puts Obama’s recovery in perspective. #4 is another warning regarding China. Finally in #5 we learn just how much of a scandal Solyndra really was.
1. Why the Republican Establishment is Against Gingrich
Bob Woodward had a lengthy article yesterday in The Washington Post, In his debut in Washington’s power struggles, Gingrich three a bomb.
The article CONCERNS NEWT’S REFUSAL AS REPUBLICAN WHIP TO GO ALONG WITH GEORGE H.W. BUSH’S 1990 DEAL WITH DEMOCRATS TO RAISE TAXES.
The deal, which breached Bush’s “read my lips, no new taxes” pledge, was one of the worst political mistakes in memory. NEWT’S PUBLIC OPPOSITION IS ONE OF THE REASONS THE REPUBLICAN OLD-TIME ESTABLISHMENT, LIKE JOHN SUNUNU, HATE NEWT SO INTENSELY.
After a lengthy interview on Dec. 11, 1992, [Newt] sent a reporter a memo trying to explain the budget communications problem. It is a classic of Gingrich paradox.
“I was telling precisely the truth but by Washington standards I was lying,” he wrote. “They were lying but by Washington standards they were telling the truth. I thought I was being very precise in setting standards, they thought I was outlining a negotiating position. I knew I could and would walk. They knew I had to stay.” …
Gingrich had been warned about this moment. HE SAID THAT A GROUP OF SENIOR REPUBLICANS WHO HAD SERVED IN PREVIOUS ADMINISTRATIONS TOLD HIM HE WOULD HAVE TO CAVE IN WHEN A DEAL WAS STRUCK.
“They all said, ‘Well [the White House and the congressional Democrats] will in the end cut a deal and they will in the end call you in a room and they will tell you, you have to agree.’ And I said, ‘Boys, there’s not a chance in hell I’m going to agree . . .’ And they all said, ‘Yes, you will, you just don’t understand, yes, you will.’ ”
He didn’t.
Supporters of the Bush tax deal blamed Newt for initially indicating he would go along and then refusing to do so. But the evidence in the article is not clear, documenting that Newt insisted on time for consideration before making a commitment.
Call this whole story a parable of what is wrong with the Republican Party. PEOPLE WHO CUT DEALS WHICH SELL OUT OUR PRINCIPLES ARE DEEMED REASONABLE, WHILE THOSE REFUSE TO CUT DEALS ARE CALLED BOMB THROWERS. That’s the term Bush used in endorsing Romney in an oblique swipe at Newt….
http://legalinsurrection.com/2011/12/they-were-wrong-in-1990-and-they-are-wrong-now/
People need to read up on Newt. There are so many stories out about him that simply aren’t true and what is put forth as eliminating him as a serious contender actually helps him with people looking for someone who can help correct what is wrong with this country.
2. Why Newt Shouldn’t be the Nominee
Ask Republicans to explain the appeal of nominating Newt Gingrich to take on President Obama and it won't be long before you're reminded of the former House speaker's intellectual and rhetorical acumen. Indeed, some Republicans become downright giddy when speaking about the prospect of Gingrich debating Obama.
It's hard to blame them. After a decade of inarticulate and reticent standard bearers, and amid a field of much the same, Republicans see in Gingrich a learned and eloquent debater able and unafraid to take it directly to the supposedly golden-tongued Orator-in-Chief.
Gingrich, many Republicans believe, would make the presidential debates something to look forward to for the first time since Reagan.
Gingrich knows that his ability to talk is his chief asset and has invited Obama to debate him in seven three-hour Lincoln-Douglas-style debates should he secure the Republican nomination. "I will concede in advance that he can use a teleprompter," Gingrich said mockingly of Obama when he proposed the debates in early December.
BUT BEFORE REPUBLICANS CONCLUDE THAT AS THEIR NOMINEE GINGRICH WOULD BE ABLE TO DEBATE HIS WAY TO THE OVAL OFFICE, THEY SHOULD TAKE A MOMENT TO REMEMBER WHAT HAPPENED THE LAST TIME OBAMA SQUARED OFF AGAINST A SMART AND ELOQUENT, BUT BOMBASTIC, POMPOUS AND EGOMANIACAL REPUBLICAN…
… These words describe almost perfectly the intellectual and rhetorical bearing and style of Newt Gingrich. Only they weren't written about Gingrich. THEY ARE BARACK OBAMA'S WORDS -- FROMTHE AUDACITY OF HOPE -- ABOUT FORMER AMBASSADOR ALAN KEYES, OBAMA'S REPUBLICAN OPPONENT IN THE 2004 ELECTION FOR ILLINOIS' OPEN SENATE SEAT.
I was struck by two things as I recently watched old footage of the 2004 Obama-Keyes debates. First, Keyes comes across as a better debater than Obama. He seems more polished, smarter, and more confident than Obama. Keyes' verbal fluency makes Obama's use of verbal fillers and stutters, his repeated words and incomplete and restarted sentences, all the more noticeable…
An interesting look at Gingrich’s primary strength, but it is flawed by a number of things. The comparison of Gingrich to Keyes is incomplete. Keyes had never lived in Illinois when he ran against Obama. He was accused of being a carpetbagger and that in and by itself doomed his candidacy from the beginning. Second, Obama wasn’t running as an incumbent with a high disapproval rating in that election. And third, the economy is a lodestone around Obama’s neck in 2012.
3. Meanwhile Obama Spins
….The jobs numbers for December are not yet released and the stats for October and November will be revised once or twice. But at the current stage, the economy gained 1,445,000 jobs in 2011; the most since 2006 when a smaller economy gained two million-plus jobs, yet the Republicans still lost both Houses of Congress that year.
THE 1.44 MILLION JOBS GAINED IN 2011 IS AN IMPROVEMENT OVER THE ALMOST ONE MILLION JOBS GAINED IN 2010, and is way better than the millions of jobs lost in the preceding two years. However, the job losses were not destined to continue forever. Moreover, 8.2 (YES, EIGHT POINT TWO) MILLION NET JOBS WERE GAINED IN THE 29 MONTHS FOLLOWING THE STEEP AND LONG 1981-1982 RECESSION, AND 2.58 MILLION JOBS WERE GAINED FOLLOWING THE SHORT AND LIGHT RECESSION THAT ENDED MARCH 1991. These numbers surpass the poor 1.21 million net jobs gained in the 29 months following the last recession. (The picture is worse if placed in the context of population and economic sizes of then versus now.)
Yes, President Obama can argue that he had a steep and long recession, but so did Reagan, yet he produced 285,517 jobs per month in the same period that Obama produced only 41,896 jobs per month. More shocking: President Ford created 171,368 jobs per month in the nineteen months after the long 1974-1975 recession through October of 1976; the month before he lost reelection….
Get ready for a lot of these kinds of figures being repeated for you by the Republicans as the 2012 election gets closer. Reality for Obama bites.
4. The Turn of China
The financial and credit crisis can now be considered truly global. China has joined the list of nations whose banks and thus, government are in trouble.
Well, now we learn that as the global insolvency wave finally moves to China, A BANKRUPTCY IS NOW CALLED SOMETHING EVEN LESS SCARY: "DEFERRED LOAN PAYMENTS" (and also explains why suddenly Japan is going to have to bail China out and buy its bonds, because somehow when China fails, it is the turn of the country that started the whole deflationary collapse to step to the plate). After all, who in their right mind would want to scare the public that the entire world is now broke. Certainly not SWIFT. And certainly not that paragon of 8%+ annual growth, where NO MATTER HOW MANY LAYERS OF LIPSTICK ARE APPLIED, THE PIGGYNESS OF IT ALL IS SHINING THROUGH EVER MORE ACUTELY. Because here are the facts, from China Daily, and they speaks for themselves: "China's biggest provincial borrowers are DEFERRING PAYMENT ON THEIR LOANS just two months after the country's regulator said some local government companies would be allowed to do so....Hunan Provincial Expressway Construction Group is DELAYING PAYMENT ON 3.11 BILLION YUAN IN INTEREST, documents governing the securities show this month. GUANGDONG PROVINCIAL COMMUNICATIONS GROUP CO, THE SECOND-LARGEST DEBTOR, IS FOLLOWING SUIT. So are two others among the biggest 11 debtors, FOR A TOTAL OF 30.16 BILLION YUAN, according to bond prospectuses from 55 local authorities that have raised money in capital markets SINCE THE BEGINNING OF NOVEMBER." So not even two months in and companies are already becoming serial defaulters, pardon, "loan payment deferrers?" And China is supposed to bail out the world? Ironically, in a world in which can kicking is now an art form, China will show everyone just how it is done, by effectively upturning the capital structure and saying that paying interest is, well, optional. In the immortal words of the comrade from Georgia, "no coupon, no problem."
Now it's China's turn to kick the can down the road hoping against hope that a solution will present itself in the future….
China has a lot of problems which generally we don’t hear much about. But China is not the savior of Europe and the socialistic practices that we and the rest of the West have grown to rely on.
5. Obama Scandal: Solyndra Update
The Solyndra scandal continues to fester and haunt the Obama Administration, as even some of the most ardent supporters of the Administration have become harsh critics. The following statement is particularly profound considering that among the multitude of reliably liberal outlets in the mainstream media, few are more dependable champions of the liberal Democrats and their agenda than the Washington Post.
“Meant to create jobs and cut reliance on foreign oil, Obama’s green-technology program was infused with politics at every level, The Washington Post found in an analysis of thousands of memos, company records and internal e-mails.”
Politics, in fact, trumped the stated objectives of job creation and the supposedly “greater good” of green energy at every turn.
THE WASHINGTON POST REVIEW OF THE SOLYNDRA SCANDAL CONCLUDED THAT THE OBAMA ADMINISTRATION WAS CONTINUALLY CONCERNED ABOUT POLITICAL “OPTICS” AND RE-ELECTION CONSEQUENCES RATHER THAN GOOD GOVERNMENT POLICY….
http://finance.townhall.com/columnists/bobbeauprez/2011/12/27/wash_post_solyndra_was_all_about_politics_not_policy
This shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone. Obama is a Chicago politician.
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