It’s a lesson that’s not too hard to understand: Newt obfuscates.
Note that he doesn’t actually lie. In fact, he didn’t lie in 1977. But he didn’t tell the whole story either.
Here’s some background from a 1995 Vanity Fair Article:
One of those women, Anne Manning, became romantically involved with Gingrich during his ’76 campaign. The curly-haired young Englishwoman, then married to another professor at West Georgia, Tim Chowns, was an avid volunteer in Newt’s Carrollton office. “I did have a relationship with him,” she discloses for the first time, “but when it suited him, he would totally blow you off.”
In the spring of 1977, she was in Washington to attend a census-bureaus workshop when Gingrich took her to dinner at a Vietnamese restaurant. He met her back at her modest hotel room. “We had oral sex,” she says. “He prefers that modus operandi because then he can say, “I never slept with her.” Indeed, before Gingrich left that evening, she says, he threatened her: “If you ever tell anybody about this, I’ll say you’re lying.” [Bold emphasis mine]
Once you understand that line of thought, everything else about Newt Gingrich makes sense.
“Newt did you lobby for Freddie Mac?” a reporter could ask.
“I never lobbied,” Gingrich could say.
“Newt did you lobby for Medicare Part D, the plan that has over $16 trillion in unfunded liabilities?”
“I never lobbied,” he could say again.
Notice the pattern: Newt knows the question he is going to get asked and he has the perfect answered prepared. It is in crafted in such an anticipatory way that he actually isn’t lying when answering.
Newt can say, “oh’ I’ve never had sex with her.”
Sure, he didn’t have “sex with her,” but he had “fellatio performed on him.”
We all know that makes little difference to his wife.
I don’t know whether Newt got that question a lot or whether he got questioned about his infidelities a lot, but I do think that’s something that hasn’t changed about him.
Even though he had a religious conversion to Catholicism in 2009, his tactics haven’t changed much.
It’s pretty sad.
But notice the other thing in this pattern: “Don’t tell anyone I did this, or I’ll say you’re lying.”
In other words, Newt Gingrich can do no wrong. Even if you point out his wrong, he’ll just say “you’re lying.”
That’s exactly what I look for in a President!
But I digress.
Now apply what you learned to those who say he lobbied Congress to support Medicare Part D.
Here is the exchange:
Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney accused former House Speaker Newt Gingrich of having lobbied in favor of Medicare Part D, the federal program that provides drugs for senior citizens, during Monday night’s Republican debate in Tampa, Florida. Romney said other congressmen said they were lobbied by Gingrich at the time.
The exchange between the two candidates included the following statements:
“You have congressmen who say that you came and lobbied them with regards to Medicare Part D.” — Romney
“I didn’t lobby them.” — Gingrich [bold emphasis mine]
See the pattern?
It goes on:
“It is not correct to describe public citizenship, having public advocacy as lobbying. Every citizen has the right to do that.” — Gingrich
“If you’re getting paid by health companies, if your entities are getting paid by health companies that could benefit from a piece of legislation and you then meet with Republican congressmen and encourage them to support that legislation, you can call it whatever you’d like. I call it influence peddling. It’s not right.” — Romney
So he didn’t lobby them per se but he did want them to vote for Medicare Part D which has unfunded liabilities in the trillions. Reports have said that Former Rep. Jeb Bradley, Rep. Jeff Flake and Former Rep. Butch Otter, and Former Rep. Marilyn Musgrave have all testified of this.
Newt didn’t lobby, he just pushed for a few votes that will hurt the taxpayer.
We all know that difference matters little to the American people.
But we also know that to Newt Gingrich supporters, they could care less.
They’re #withnewt
You’re STILL here… spouting HATE and LIES and more HATE and disgusting LIES… I so hoped you’d move on after the SC primary… PLEASE RON PAUL is in NEVADA now… why don’t you go there and bother those people now…