Let me praise Newt Gingrich.
When nobody else could imagine a Republican House majority, New Gingrich saw it and made it so. If you are a backbench legislator doomed to decades in the minority, Gingrich is just the bomb thrower and innovator you need.
If a student finds history boring, Professor Gingrich will make it exciting. He will gallop across ideas until any dullard can see why old events still matter today. Professor Newt may not always be right, and one can question some of his connections, but nobody will leave class without knowing history counts.
If a radio show needs a guest with a comment on anything, Newt Gingrich is ready. He has thought about most things and can speak about all things. Gingrich may have a face made for radio, but even on television he has a crafted soundbite to sum up the world.
If the Republican Party needs a senior statesman to remind her of her better days, then Newt Gingrich can help. He remembers every day of the Republican Revolution as only an insider can.
If a conservative project needs a pitchman or an interest a lobbyist, Gingrich is effective. He has contacts all over Washington and will give a decent days lobbying for a good days pay.
In fact, there are so many things Gingrich can do that it is easy to forget that there are a few things he cannot do. He cannot use the bully pulpit to renew marriage, because he has been no gentleman. We have had cads, and recovered cads, in the White House, but nobody should vote for one knowingly.
As a sinner saved by grace, I need mercy and hope for it, but putting a man in the White House is not a necessary sign of our tolerance and mercy.
Gingrich cannot manage an office let alone a country. He has a record of creating chaos wherever he goes and running through staff like Sherman ran through Georgia. He was ineffectual as a leader of the Republican Party, routinely getting schooled by Bill Clinton. He does not finish what he starts, flitting from project to project.
Newt Gingrich has become a corporation in himself. He has done whatever he could to monetize his every breath. It it is a free market and he has a right do so, but as Palin and Trump discovered, we want our leaders like Lincoln and not Gantry. Lincoln did well by doing good, but he never wanted to be rich.
One cannot say the same for Gingrich.
Gingrich often has the right ideas, but he seldom incarnates them.
Newt Gingrich is fit for many things, but he is unfit to serve as President of the United States. He will never get my vote, but I look forward to seeing him again in the many roles for which his decisions and talents have so finely fitted him to serve.
November 19th, 2011 | 7:18 pm | #1
It occurs to me that Romney has precisely those necessary virtues that Gingrich lacks. On the far right, Romney’s biggest disability is that he is moderate enough that independent voters feel comfortable voting for him in preference to Obama, something that cannot be consistently said of the other Republican contestants. How sad that a core of Republicans are fixated on finding a candidate who is so reflective of the most conservative wing of their party that he can never be elected president.
November 20th, 2011 | 1:20 pm | #2
I didn’t know he was running for a church leadership position.
November 20th, 2011 | 8:47 pm | #3
He is running for head of state. As head of state, he represents us at symbolic events. Newt is a dreadful choice for that role.
November 20th, 2011 | 9:06 pm | #4
I dig the politics man. Partisan without apology.
November 20th, 2011 | 10:11 pm | #5
*uncopywrited* prayer to freeley distribute as the spirit leads~~
Billy graham to benedict to joel osteen to DOCTOR john mark reynolds PHD coming all together to fasting and to praying and to breaking Gods sweet sweet manna under the great cloud of witnesses among whom we see with insurence of faith Abraham and Lincoln and Reagan. The tea party is the true party all praying for the stimulis of God driving out the magots and the mormons and the mortgage lenders with jehovah jirehs milk and his honey and his holy holy hallelujah fire.
Amen.
November 21st, 2011 | 11:25 am | #6
Juniper,
Really?
To state the obvious:
1. God has no party. He is a monarchist.
2. Our political leaders need not be Christians to be good political leaders.
3. Some Christians are not fit political leaders.
As for partisan, since an overwhelming number of white Evangelicals are GOP voters, a party founded appealing for their votes, that one candidate is unfit seems important.
November 22nd, 2011 | 8:43 am | #7
John Mark Reynolds
“He is running for head of state. As head of state, he represents us at symbolic events. Newt is a dreadful choice for that role.”
In my observation, most other countries aren’t very finicky about having a head-of-state who isn’t a cad.
Why do you think a US president should be our role-model, anyway? Why not ministers, or missionaries, or parents?
November 22nd, 2011 | 2:50 pm | #8
It seems to me that electing the President as “Role Model in Chief” is rather misguided.
Reagan was divorced and reputed to have been rather distant as a father, Washington and Jefferson owned slaves. Adams (the elder) disowned his own son. Andrew Jackson was a violent oppressor of Native Americans, Lincoln was depressive and melancholic and led us into the most violent and bloody war ever on our soil. Teddy Roosevelt expressed an admiration for eugenics… FDR? — a long time adulterous affair? JFK? — well we know all about him… and that’s just off the top of my head.
On the other hand Jimmy Carter seems (aside from the moral preening) to be a pretty good role model. The current President seems like a fine father and husband. However, neither was (or is) even an adequate President to my mind. So…
Isn’t it the Left who is most often accused of wanting to “immanentize the eschaton”?
I think it was Cal Thomas who wrote once that “the Messiah is never going to arrive on Air Force One” …
November 22nd, 2011 | 11:27 pm | #9
Yes and Amen. God is USA Monarch. White Evangelicals making world bow. The obvious!
Doctor John Mark Reynolds (P.H.D.)
~Freely change uncopyrited prayer as spirit leeds~
November 23rd, 2011 | 12:16 am | #10
JMR,
You and I both believe in redemption. Redemption is for sinners, for persons like you, me, and Gingrich. Give the man time to show that his redemption is real. He’s a recent convert to Catholicism, and he has publicly declared both the reality his errors and of his change of heart. I have seen nothing since that change occurred that makes me doubt him. If you have, then share it. If not, then remember that we Christians are cut from the same piece of cloth as Gingrich.
November 27th, 2011 | 12:40 am | #11
Dr. Bauman,
As a fellow prodigal, I welcome Mr. Gingrich home, but the White House is a more than a fatted calf. The elder brother after all kept the farm.
Good sense and mercy in that Father!
November 29th, 2011 | 2:52 pm | #12
Anyone but Obama.
November 29th, 2011 | 9:28 pm | #13
TUAD,
I’m not convinced that’s a good standard for voting. While I haven’t liked what has happened under the Obama presidency (increase in war, unjustified targeted killings, extending Bush’s tax cuts, amongst others), that doesn’t mean that any other option would be inherently good. Some might even be worse. That same mindset is what helped get Obama elected: “Anybody but Bush” (admittedly, that was a pretty terrible presidency, but nevertheless still a bad mindset). I know that my ballot won’t likely be for Obama, but it’s not because he’s necessarily the worst choice.
November 29th, 2011 | 10:31 pm | #14
Truly scary if Obama is not worse than the GOP candidate.
(Assuming that a 3rd party candidate has no real, viable chance to win).
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