CONTENTS
Supreme Court Nominee Controvery
Newt Changes Whats Left of His Mind on End Of Life Care
Gingrich running for President in 2012?
Click Here to go to Newt Gingrich Lied
Introduction to Newton "Newt" Leroy Gingrich (born June 17, 1943) is an American politician, author, former Speaker of the United States House of Representatives, 1994 Time magazine Person of the Year, college history professor, professional hypocrite, loudmouth, panderer, adulterer, and a dick.
Gingrich's first name comes
from an abbreviation of Newton and not from his parents naming him after
a lizard. It is extremely unlikely that a man with such jowls could've
ever been likened to a long, slender animal surviving on a healthy, high
protein diet.
Through such landmarks as the Contract with America and the subsequent
Republican Revolution, Gingrich would follow the time-honored—if
paradoxical—Republican Party tradition of somehow cementing a favorable
legacy while almost never achieving an approval rating above 50%.
Though Gingrich's career has been mostly comprised of attacks on other
officials and a spotty ethical and moral record, he has maintained a
prominent position in a faltering party searching for a clear leader
who's not a complete embarrassment.
A champion of Christian morality, Gingrich had three different wives
over 35 years, though during that period, was only unmarried for a total
of less than a year. Simple arithmetic suggests that either Gingrich is
incredibly impulsive or his position on family values might include a
bit more extramarital fucking than one might have originally thought.
Early
life
Gingrich was born in 1943 to Newton Searles McPherson and
Kathleen Daugherty, two people who, though young in age, clearly got their
names from the 1800s.
At his birth, Gingrich's father and mother were only 19 and 16,
respectively. Considering this fact, it is fortunate that the nickname
"Newt" Gingrich stuck rather than the more cumbersome, yet more accurate
sobriquet Newton "Statutory Rape" Gingrich.
With his father mostly out of the picture, Gingrich's mother raised him on
her own until she married Robert Gingrich, meaning that technically, since
his birth, Gingrich has consistently been a burden to single mothers.
Gingrich received a B.A. from Emory University (noted for it's fine medical
program) and an M.A. from Tulane University (noted for its proximity to the
Girls Gone Wild bus).
When he was 19, Gingrich slept with and married his high school geometry
teacher who switched religions for him, mothered two of his children and
funded his undergraduate and graduate education only to be dumped and
divorced by Gingrich several years later when he decided she wasn't "young
enough or pretty enough to be the president's wife. In a dick move that
makes even John Edwards look like Ward Cleaver in a stage production of the
life of Mother Teresa, Gingrich got his wife to agree to a very one-sided
divorce while she was recovering in a hospital from uterine cancer.
Political Career
Gingrich decided to run for congress in 1974, one of the
worst years to be a Republican. He lost two elections, though his campaign
treasurer later said, "We'd have won in 1974 if we could have kept him out
of the office, screwing (a campaign volunteer) on the desk." Eventually,
Gingrich did pause the desk sex long enough to get elected to congress in a
few years later.
Gingrich's early career was primarily focused on impugning his colleagues,
which, as many historical dicks have realized, is far better at boosting
one's party standing than, say, writing important legislation, creating
helpful regulations, or any of the other silly duties that congressmen are
elected to perform.
Often, these accusations were leveled despite Gingrich's own guilty past.
For example, Gingrich was a leader of the inquiry into congressmen writing
bad checks in the early 90s, whilst he had actually written 20 of them
himself. It is unknown how many of these checks were for replacement desktop
calendars.
In 1994, Gingrich was the lead strategist and author of the Contract with
America, a series of reforms put forward by House Republicans such as
minority-dick John Boehner. Though most Americans had little interest in the
goals of the Contract and it arguably accomplished very little, "Contract
with America" sounds fancy and made it seem like the Republicans were
actually working on something together.
A similar achievement would be repeated in the Senate just a few years
following when John Ashcroft, Larry Craig, Trent Lott, and James Jeffords
would form the "Singing Senators" barbershop quartet.
Gingrich's work was partly responsible for the Republican Revolution of '94,
which returned the first Republican majority to the House since the 1954
congress (a congress that was so popular, people shot at them.)
Interestingly, Gingrich also caused the demise of Republican momentum when
he got all pissy and caused a government shut down after President Clinton
made him sit in the back of Air Force One. It was as though Gingrich was a
modern Rosa Parks, if you replaced all the important civil rights stuff with
the sound little kids make when there are only grape popsicles left.
These events elevated Gingrich to an easy election to Speaker
of the newly Republican House. During this distinguished, four-year tenure,
Gingrich faced eighty-four charges for ethics violations. And that's not
even counting those from his immediate family.
By 1997, there was already a secret conspiracy formed to force Gingrich out
of his position, though he out-maneuvered it. In 1998, no longer able to
ignore the fact that most of the population hated him and it was costing his
party elections nationwide, Gingrich stepped down from both his Speaker
position and his elected office.
Clinton Impeachment
Gingrich, perhaps, found himself most directly in the
American spotlight during the beginnings of the Monica Lewinski scandal when
he regularly attacked President Bill Clinton for his immorality, pointing to
"a level of disrespect and decadence that should appall every American."
It was later revealed that, during this period, Gingrich himself was having
sex with a congressional aide in her 20s. Historians are unsure exactly how
many Americans were appalled by this, but at least one (his wife) was
particularly appalled, especially when he called to divorce her on mother's
day.
The aide, Callista Bisek, eventually became his third wife after the affair
led to a divorce from his previous spouse. While she was certainly "young
enough" to be the president's wife, whether or not she is "pretty enough" is
certainly up for debate.
Post-Speaker
Although Gingrich resigned from both the Speakership and
congress, he has been unable to refrain from making himself the center of
attention on a number of major issues, regardless of whether anyone is
interested in his opinions.
With a distinct lack of available female aides, Gingrich spends most of his
time providing commentary on Fox News, threatening to run for President, and
sitting on the boards of various "think-tanks," organizations that exist for
the sole purpose of being next to people's names in the National Review.
In 2007, Gingrich launched the American Solutions for Winning the Future, a
"non-partisan" 527 group that "non-partisanly" supports an entirely
Republican point of view. The group's primary campaign focused on seeking
domestic energy solutions and was titled Drill Here. Drill Now. Pay Less.
Coincidentally, this was also the slogan from Gingrich's second divorce.
Gingrich has also authored a number of popular books. While mostly the kind
of non-fiction that's holding up your aging, conservative dad's coffee table
post-father's day, Gingrich has also co-authored a number of fictional,
alternate history books, an appropriate line of work for a person who so
frequently struggles to keep basic historical facts straight.
Amongst these works are novels about the Nazis defeating the Soviet Union,
the Japanese implementing a more effective Pacific strategy, and the South
defeating the North at Gettysburg. It is worth noting the appropriateness of
Gingrich's remarkably keen interest in reimagining the lives of famous
losers.
Supreme Court Nominee Controversy
In May 2009, Gingrich posted a comment on Twitter calling
Supreme Court nominee Judge Sonia Sotomayor a racist. While some were merely
upset to learn that Twitter has become so lame that Newt Gingrich has an
account, many more people were upset about the contents of the remark
itself. Interestingly, outside observers point out that this comment comes
from a man who spends his free time writing fantasies about the South
winning Civil War battles.
Of course, being politically astute and realizing that he'd probably just
offended 45 million potential voters his party needs to even hope of
succeeding, Gingrich quickly backpedaled his statement in the most public
display of pandering to the Hispanic community since The George Lopez Show.
Trivia
Gingrich was, along with Michael Steele, the chairman of
Conservative group GOPAC, an organization is best remembered for being under
constant investigation. Gingrich has blamed liberalism for
the shootings at Columbine, for the shootings at Virginia Tech, and for
children dressing up as pimps and prostitutes for Halloween. Conservative
Gingrich most likely prefers young girls dressed up as unpaid campaign
volunteers. One former lover reported: "We had oral sex. He prefers
that modus operandi because then he can say, 'I never slept with her,'" a
line of reasoning noticeably absent from Gingrich's book Rediscovering God
in America. Newt Gingrich hates puppies.
Newt Gingrich Changes What’s Left of his Mind on End-of-life Care
More than 20 percent of all Medicare spending occurs in the last two months of life. Gundersen Lutheran Health System in La Crosse, Wisconsin has developed a successful end-of-life, best practice that combines: 1) community-wide advance care planning, where 90 percent of patients have advance directives; 2) hospice and palliative care; and 3) coordination of services through an electronic medical record. The Gundersen approach empowers patients and families to control and direct their care. The Dartmouth Health Atlas has documented that Gundersen delivers care at a 30 percent lower rate than the national average ($18,359 versus $25,860). If Gundersen’s approach was used to care for the approximately 4.5 million Medicare beneficiaries who die every year, Medicare could save more than $33 billion a year.
via Health Care Rx: Across the Country, Some Systems Are Getting It Right – Newt Gingrich.
That was Newt Gingrich just a few months ago praising the “Advance Directives” practiced by a hospital in Wisconsin. Advance Directives are another word for the end-of-life consultations that the teabggers have been flipping out over of late. Gingrich loved them a few months ago. This is Gingrich a few months before that, responding to a PBS query:
Let me give you an example that I find fascinating. In LaCrosse, Wisc., the Gundersen Lutheran Hospital system is, according to the Dartmouth [Atlas of Health Care], the least expensive place in America for the last two years of life. They have an advanced directive program, and over 90 percent of their patients have an advanced directive. They have electronic health records, so everybody on the staff knows what the advanced directive is. They have a very strong palliative care program for using drugs to manage pain. They have a hospice program.
The result is today, the last two years of your life in costs are about $13,600. The last two years of your life at UCLA are $58,000. Now, why should Medicare pay $58,000 for the same outcome if it could pay $13,600? You can say, well, Los Angeles is more expensive; they do a couple of more complicated things. So fine. So let’s say it ought to be $20,000 at UCLA. That’s still [$38,000] less than it currently is. …
We don’t think the politicians can ever fix this because the hospital lobby is so powerful, and the doctor lobby is so powerful, and the pharmaceutical lobby is so powerful, and the medical technology lobby is so powerful…
And we also know — this is the great irony — the best places in America are always less expensive than the worst places. Health is not like jewelry and automobiles. In jewelry and automobiles you pay a lot more to get a lot better. In health, because the best places do it right the first time, they do it very efficiently, they pay real attention to quality, they’re actually less expensive than the places that are bad.
Newt Gingrich speaks in Washington on June 8 (Chip Somodevilla/Getty)
He’s pretty unequivocal here. Well, what happens when suddenly the Republican party decides it wants to scare the shit out of a bunch of old people by telling them the new health care bill is going to include a provision in which “death panels” ask them “when they want to die”? Now all of the sudden Gingrich is violently against the same programs he was so windily praising earlier this year.
And make no mistake, this is exactly the same thing. The only thing that’s actually in the health care proposals is a provision that would allow Medicare to pay for exactly the kind of programs Gingrich praised, on a voluntary basis. The programs are not government-administered in any way, there’s just government money now to pay for the private programs. And now Gingrich is suddenly aghast at them:
On This Week he argued with George Stephanopolous and Howard Dean about the programs. Check it out:
STEPHANOPOLOUS: The only thing that’s in the bill is that Medicare would pay for what they say is voluntary counseling on end-of-life issues.
GINGRICH: I think people are very concerned when you start talking about cost-controls… you’re asking us to trust the government. Now I’m not talking about the Obama administration, I’m talking about the government. You’re asking us to believe that the government is to be trusted. We know people who’ve said routinely, well, you’re going to have to make decisions. You’re going to have to decide. Communal stadards, historically, is a very dangerous concept.
STEPHANOPOLOUS: It’s not in the bill.
GINGRICH: (stammering) B-but, the bill’s… a thousand pages of setting up mechanisms. It sets up 45 different agencies. It has all sorts of panels. You’re asking us to trust the government when there clearly are people in the government who believe in establishing euthanasia, including selective standards.
In other words, there may not be a death panel in the bill, but there are other panels, and while no one has actually ever said such a thing and it is not relevant to this particular discussion, I nonetheless assert that in general it is true that “people in government” believe in euthanasia.
Amazing. I mean, talk about being full of shit. This is as clear a case as you will ever find of a politician just getting up on television and just flat-out dogging it, saying something without even the faintest shred of belief, just as a means to an end. What an asshole!
I know some politicians have kind of a wink-wink nudge-nudge attitude towards lying, and some of them in private will act almost like it’s funny, part of the job description. But there are limits to how much even a politician should be allowed to lie. That’s especially when he’s lying in order to scare a bunch of old people.
Exclusive: Newt Gingrich ‘Sharing Resources, Coordinating Efforts’ With Oil Lobby
Newt
Gingrich, through his political attack group “American Solutions for
Winning the Future” (ASWF), has organized tea party protests,
conservative legislative efforts, and is best known for driving the
Republican “Drill
Here, Drill Now” campaign in 2008.
Until now, the only known financial backers of ASWF were the
donors
disclosed on his 527 IRS forms, like
Peabody Coal
and investor
Rex Sinquefield.
Gingrich — who once believed in climate change science and believed
the U.S. must act “urgently”
to reduce carbon emissions — has moved far to the right on
environmental issues, and has allied himself with polluters fighting
tooth and nail
against clean
energy reform.
While his support from King Coal is widely known, new revelations reveal that Gingrich has established direct support from the oil lobby. The American Petroleum Institute (API) is the umbrella trade association for the oil industry, lobbying on behalf of corporations like ExxonMobil and Chevron, as well as for refineries and pipeline companies. In addition to spending millions on political lobbying, API has blanketed the country with pro-oil drilling ads and has coordinated “grassroots” rallies to oppose clean energy reform.
At CPAC — which was sponsored in part by API — ThinkProgress spoke to API representative André Carter at his organization’s booth at the convention. Carter is an account executive at Edelman, the K Street public relations firm that manages API. Carter told ThinkProgress that API has been “sharing resources, coordinating efforts” with Gingrich’s ASWF group for some time. When contacted for comment, API spokesman Bill Bush disputed that API was “working in any way” with Gingrich.
ASWF spokesman R.C. Hammond also denied Carter’s comments, telling ThinkProgress that “there’s no record of us working together.” But ThinkProgress interviewed Gingrich yesterday at an event he was hosting at the press club, where he told us that indeed he has been working with API since the “Drill Here, Drill Now” campaign:
TP: But do you know how long you guys have been working with API? I’m trying to chart it.
GINGRICH: I have no idea. I think it came after the Drill Here, Drill Now campaign.
Listen here:
Gingrich postures as a man dedicated to simply serving the “key concerns of the American People.” But through ASWF, his constant strategy sessions with GOP lawmakers, and his ubiquitous punditry, Gingrich is actually advancing the narrow interests of corporations, in this case the oil industry. Given API’s attempt to conceal its relationship with ASWF, the oil industry understands they need ostensibly independent ambassadors like Gingrich to build public support for their policies.
As the Wonk Room has detailed, GOP politicians fighting reform have relied heavily on corporate lobbyists to orchestrate their efforts. Gingrich touts himself as an author, a “futurist,” a conservative thinker. Anything but a lobbyist. Considering the fact Gingrich lobbies lawmakers on policy, and does so in concert with industry that would benefit from his lobbying, in many ways Gingrich is essentially an unregistered lobbyist.
Gingrich May be Running for President in 2012?
Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich did something on Sunday a bit unexpected: He urged his fellow Republicans to ignore calls for ideological purity within the party.
"Shrug them off," the conservative firebrand told CBS's "Face the Nation." "Reagan shrugged them off. Reagan was frequently attacked. I talked to Michael Reagan the other night, President Reagan's son, who pointed out that Reagan had done all sorts of things that were deviances from the conservative purity. But people knew in general he was a conservative. People accepted him as a conservative. And he built a very broad coalition."
Watch:
The remarks illustrate the growing effort within the GOP to smooth the edges of its image. "My advice is that Colin Powell is a great American," Gingrich said. "I'm proud that he is a Republican. Dick Cheney is a great American. I'm glad both of them are Republicans."
The remarks also reflect one of two opposite schools of thought on how to resuscitate the Republican Party. The other, widely-held philosophy is that the GOP suffered electoral defeats over the past two cycles precisely because elected officials did not heed calls for ideological purity.
Gingrich's "shrug-it-off approach" seems more practical in theory than in practice. After all, the former Speaker himself has played a leading role in demanding certain litmus tests of Republican figures, whether it be on supporting tax cuts or opposing the Employee Free Choice Act. And as he contemplates making a run at the Republican nomination for president in 2012, the allure of appealing to the party's base seems likely to be more tempting than a lofty belief in ideological inclusiveness.
Even Gingrich's CBS appearance was not free of divisive rhetoric. In explaining his previous comments on Judge Sonia Sotomayor, he suggested her writing was "racialist."
When I did a Twitter about her, having read what she said, I said that was racist -- but I applied it to her as a person. And the truth is I don't know her as a person. It's clear that what she said was racist, and it's clear -- or as somebody wrote recently, "racialist" if you prefer.
