Friday, January 27, 2012

NRO's Elliot Abrams Caught in Distortion about Newt Gingrich


Another courageous person comes out of the woodwork to defend Newt Gingrich against the lies and distortions being coordinated by the Romney campaign. Today in the American Spectator, Jeffrey Lord writes about Chris Scheve who made a valiant effort to retrieve the original transcript of Gingrich’s entire 1986 Special Order speech. We once again find the attack against Gingrich to be false.
* That's right. Mr. Scheve, incensed at what he felt was a deliberate misrepresentation of his old boss by Abrams and the Romney forces, specifically of Gingrich's long ago March 21, 1986 "Special Order" speech on the floor of the House, and aware "that most of his [Abrams'] comments had to have been selectively taken from the special order" -- Scheve started digging. Since the Congressional Record for 1986 was difficult to obtain electronically, Scheve trekked to the George Mason Library to physically track down the March 21, 1986 edition of the Congressional Record. Locating it, copying and scanning, he was kind enough to send to me.

* "But in apparent service to the Romney campaign, in order to make Newt Gingrich appear to be doing just that, Abrams apparently quite deliberately cut out the original Gingrich reference to Will, Kirkpatrick, Krauthammer, and Kristol.

* The main point is that the Newt Gingrich who spoke on the floor of the House on March 21, 1986, was thoroughly pro-Reagan, honestly engaging in a serious intellectual effort to assess the strengths and weaknesses of American foreign policy in the day from a hierarchy of vision, strategy, operations or projects and then last but not least, tactics.

In grossly misrepresenting this speech as some sort of anti-Reagan jihad, Elliott Abrams has ironically only called attention to Governor Romney's lack of strengths and experience in this area."
Please click the link to read the piece in it’s entirety: Elliott Abrams Caught Misleading on Newt

13 comments:

Anonymous said...

I read the whole thing, and I fail to find the distortion. It's not taken out of context, and even if it was, Newt is quoted saying the very things Abrams reported. There is no substance to this charge.

Even Rush admitted Abrams is of impeccable character.

I find it very disheartening to see the way good people who are willing to speak out are being demonized by the Newt forces.

-Martha

-Martha

Slick-Willy said...

LOL. Watch the clip. Newt flat-out trashes Reagan for about 30 seconds and it's no cut/paste job. That's not to say Newt was "anti-Reagan." It simply points out that Newt was not a hardcore "pro-Reagan" guy either--he was very critical of Reagan's policies (for good reason in some cases). Newt's problem is that he's spent substantial time attacking Mitt for selective statements from 1994 where Mitt wasn't "pro-Reagan" and acting like that is a big deal. It's not. But Newt was hardly a fiercely loyal Reagan foot soldier either.

Anonymous said...

There is also a video clip from a 1988 CSPAN interview where Gingrich said that Bush needs to realize that we needed to move on from the policies of the Reagan era.

Bottom line..Gingrich has been in Washington for 40 plus years and Romney never worked in Washington. Romney has the strong support of 80 plus congressmen whereas Gingrich has the support of about 11.........that to me speaks volumes.

Anonymous said...

Texas, I think the main point of Abrams article was that although Newt voted for Reagan;s policies, he also voiced his criticism at times that were very damaging to Reagan.

Did you even read the Abrams article? If you did, you would understand the point of it.

-Martha

Ohio JOE said...

"I read the whole thing, and I fail to find the distortion" That is because it is not about Mr. Romney.

Anonymous said...

Newt has attempted on a very consistent basis to wrap himself in the Reagan mantle and cast himself as the sole "Heir Apparent" to Reagan. And the fact is that Newt was not entirely the Reagan-loyalist that he claims himself to be.

Not to mention that Newt doesn't seem to know whether he was a Goldwater Republican or a Rockefeller Republican. Oh wait...yes he does...he's whichever type is required for the given situation.

Isn't it funny that Romney gets the "flip-flop" label for moving to the right over the years but Newt gets the "Tea Party" label for being all things to all people at all times.

-Phil

Terrye said...

What a bunch of cry babies, you people can dish it out but you can not take it..If I had a dollar for every time I have seen some so-called anti establishment true conservative cherry picked a comment by Romney..or took it out of context...I could pay off my car..

But you get a little of it back and you not only whine, you get self righteous.

What distortion? I remember the real Gingrich. I have been listening to him run his mouth for decades. This is the way he is.

Terrye said...

Ohio Joe:

What is that supposed to mean? Talk radio has been trying for months to destroy Romney...all day every day they spew their venom....what would it cost Gingrich to actually pay for that kind of advertising?

And half of that stuff has been dishonest..and yet that was fine with people.

Publius Nemo said...

How can his opinion and view be seen as misleading? Mr. Gingrich's own words are not misleading. While he supported Reagan 9 times out of 10 he was on occasion disloyal. He is a political animal and did what was best for his career. I don't blame him for that entirely but I think the most we can say about Newt on this subject is that he was, on occasion, disloyal to President Reagan. Disagreement is one thing but we disagree with the president behind closed doors and come out as a coalition united. President Bush had the same complaint about Mr. Gingrich so I think that must be pretty accurate. He is disloyal and his record supports that claim.

Anonymous said...

-Martha

I know Eliott Abrams and Charles Krauthammer and worked in the Republican Congress during the 1990's and Eliott Abrams is factually wrong on this. I went to the public library and got the microfiche of the Congressional Record and have all 8 pages of Gingrich's speech and it was NO attack on Reagan.

Eliott Abrams was duped and did damage to himself by falling for such material fed to him by the Romney campaign.

The fact is Romney is an unworthy candidate and a gutter snipe that relies on proxies to advance his pathetic candidacy.

While Gingrich was fighting for Reagan in the 1980's and taking on the media and the lethargic Congressional Republican leadership at the time, Mitt Romney was an independent and publicly distancing himself from Reagan.

And Eliott knows this! he's just shilling for a job in a Romney administration and he should be ashamed of himself.

Mitt Romney is an absolute disgrace that has no place in the Republican Party and if he had any decency he'd leave the Party immediately.

Ohio JOE said...

"yet that was fine with people." It is not fine with all people. My own local radio talk show host is not a Romneyite this time around, but he still called Mr. Gingrich out on his dishonesty.

Anonymous said...

I think it's despicable the way people are smearing Abrams, and saying his motivation is either doing this because Romney asked him too, in some sort of conspiracy to get Newt, or because he wants a job in the Romney administration.

How low can Newt's people go?

NR is standing by Abrams. And, they did not ask him to write the piece.

-Martha

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/289558/jeffrey-lords-distortion-rich-lowry

Anonymous said...

The video I have seen has been heavily cut and spliced. There are transcripts of the speech available, which is why people are claiming it is a fraud, but oddly I haven't been able to find the transcripts. Working on it. In any case, even if he was the biggest Reagan fan that ever lived on the planet, he is a bad choice to represent the Republican party. Perfect for the Dems though, but not for the "moral majority".