Gingrich Warns Of Third Party Breakout
By Justin Gardner | Related entries in 2012 Election, 3rd Party, Newt, Republicans
I think I’ve said this before, but the Republicans definitely run the risk of being fractured between the social and the fiscal conservatives. Because call him whatever you like, but Bush was not a fiscal conservative. And there are A LOT of fiscally conservative folks who really despise the less tolerant aspects of social conservatism.
Now Newt is weighing in on the obvious split and since I’m moderately cynical…I think he’s starting to lay the groundwork for a 3rd party run.
“If the Republicans can’t break out of being the right wing party of big government, then I think you would see a third party movement in 2012,†Gingrich said Tuesday. The speech, to a group of students at the College of the Ozarks in Missouri, was recorded by Springfield TV station KY3.But Gingrich, bemoaning President Barack Obama’s “monstrosity of a budget,†acknowledged that Republicans are partially to blame for the escalation in federal spending.
“Remember, everything Obama’s doing, Bush started last year,†he said. “If you’re going to talk about big spending, the mistakes of the Bush administration last year are fully as bad as the mistakes of Obama’s first two, three months.â€
Want more proof that Gingrich is thinking 3rd party? His American Solutions group is starting to get its hooks into the “Tea Party” movement.
Long story short, Newt knows a movement when he sees it and if there’s a chance he could use it to raise his profile, well, all the better.
More as it develops…
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April 2nd, 2009 at 3:36 pm
Gingrich has always fancied himself Righty Moses. Don’t think for a second that he hasn’t nursed his resentment over his ouster from the King Surfer of the GOP tide that crested with the contract with America.
As I have said many times before, the chances of a purifying jaunt in the wilderness by the base have been growing and growing, ever since McCain’s nomination.
And Gingrich would dearly love to be the populist leader of another such parade, complete with a list of bullet points marketed with a clever new name. Score-settling? Count on it. In fact, I would be shocked if the bullet list isn’t half done and the naming committee in the semi-final round of winnowing. The final name for the new contract of simplistic ideas for angry conservative Americans is anyone’s guess, but rest assured it will come wrapped in apple pie, a flag, and a bible. My suggestion is probably too long, despite its accuracy.
Gingrich may realize that being the figurehead of this movement has a ceiling no higher than kingmaker, so he may end up as something more like the puppetmaster this time. Sara Palin would seem poised to play the lovely Maid Marionette.
The top bullet is virtually certain to be “no new taxes, this time we really mean it.” Some of the rest is probably still being focus-tested.
April 2nd, 2009 at 3:42 pm
If Newt does make a third party run (personally I think its more likely for him to run as a Republican) it will have its one-shot impact at influencing the Republican Party to return to Contract With America conservatism. We have a strict two-party system in the long run in America and whenever a third party movement comes and goes it has the impact of influencing one or both of the major parties. Therefore, this third party will mean a new Republican Party when the dust has settled.
April 2nd, 2009 at 4:13 pm
Gingrich is nuts. He has as much chance of being president as I do. He’s a deeply unlikable, borderline obnoxious man. For all his reputation as a man of ideas he’s just another windbag selling the same old same old.
April 2nd, 2009 at 4:20 pm
Although Gingrich may have the name recognition to be a third party candidate, he is too tied to the Republican party to have the credibility to be successful. A real run would require to get a big part of the conservative and middle of the road Democrats and I don’t see that happening unless things get a lot worse in the economy.
April 2nd, 2009 at 5:11 pm
Gingrich doesn’t have to run to head up a 3rd party. He’s smart enough to know that he can’t win on a national level, and he’s also smart enough to know that a 3rd party stands a real chance of success in the next election. The “R’s” are dead for at least a decade – it’ll take them that long to move all those stupid old men out to pasture. I would look closely at a third party since I am socially liberal but fiscally conservative (to a degree) – neither party really matches my political desires – there must be millions who feel the same way in this country. I say bring it on – mixing things up politically is way over due.
April 2nd, 2009 at 5:18 pm
Hear, Hear. Now stop blaming fiscal conservativism (a.k.a. capitalism) for our current economic situation.
April 2nd, 2009 at 5:27 pm
TerenceC: Have you heard of the Libertarian Party? If the worst of the anarchists can ever get co-opted and a slightly more moderate stance taken, I think Libertarians could make some serious inroads.
Of course, that would imply the Libertarian party ever wants to become something larger. which, I think most of the people wouldn’t know what to do if they suddenly had power.
Doesn’t mean I don’t respend and Love the ideals, just think they could use some more … tempering
April 2nd, 2009 at 6:05 pm
There are entire Socialist countries that are fiscally conservative, so being a conservative does equate to being a capitalist.
April 2nd, 2009 at 6:07 pm
Oh, Jimmy, you know it’s not that simple. fiscal conservatism also claims that less regulation is the better course for the economy — the invisible hand of the market, risk others’ money, not your own, if you’re not cheating, you’re not trying, and all that.
The blame is accurately laid at the feet of fiscal conservatism.
April 2nd, 2009 at 9:22 pm
Newt had his chance to be come president back in 1994-1998, but he didn’t play his cards right at the time to move beyond being House Speaker. Unlike Reagan and Nixon, there will not be a second chance for Mr. Gingrich because the aforementioned California Politicians were never marred by scandal until after they were elected for a second term. By contrast, this guy has already been disgraced and forced to step down. Americans might elect a loser into national office, but not a total loser like Newt is!
April 2nd, 2009 at 11:15 pm
Gingrich is quite far to the right in terms of being socially conservative. If he’s going to run as a third party, it’s going to effectively be the same as the current Republican party.
No thanks.
April 2nd, 2009 at 11:30 pm
I think we’re about to see how smart Gingrich really is. Oh, he’s “intellect smart” all right, and he’s “policy smart” and articulate as well. He’s also succinct and direct, which makes him a rare bird in political circles.
But is he “really smart”? If he is “really smart” he will already realize that he is never going to be POTUS, but he would also realize that he IS capable of defining what viable 3rd party candidates at various levels in the hierarchy (local, state, federal, think tank) need to be saying and doing in order to break out of the age-old stereotype of 3rd parties being “fringe” and/or “single issue” and/or more about a person, a narrow cause, or a quixotic dream.
I have been ready for a viable 3rd party defined primarily by “principles of governance” instead of “positions on issues” and/or “interests” (if you get what I mean). I wouldn’t back a party because it is defined by Gingrich as a candidate, but I sure would take a close look at a 3rd party that was set in motion by Gingrich, and that created a message and slate of candidates that were, for want of a better term, “transparent populists”, dedicated to restoring founder principles, reining in the expansion of the Federal government and focusing on an appropriate balance among the branches of government.
April 2nd, 2009 at 11:42 pm
Bring it.
It would be nice to have a political party composed of traditional fiscal conservatives without nutcases — er, I mean controversial personalities — like Limbaugh, Palin, and Cheney on board.
April 3rd, 2009 at 8:53 am
I think there at a whole host of people who count themselves as fiscal conservatives solely on the basis of their belief that both individuals and governments should spend and live and act within the constraints of their resources.
You can be a fiscal conservative without being an utter free-market true believer.
IMO, it’s fine to send some blame the way of whatever subset of fiscal conservatives qualifies as Wall Street lap dogs. Free market true believers might even be right when they say badly managed banks ought to be let to fail, but they are IMO certainly wrong to claim that a poorly regulated market in many respects led to excesses that caused this collapse. It was a too-free market that allowed mass originations of loans to folks with grossly insufficient income to pay them off. And it was a free market that allowed private firms with blatant conflicts of interest to blithely rate extremely suspect invest vehicles as AAA investment grade products safe enough to be bought by pension plans and so on.
The sooner the free market folks forthrightly concede the utter disgrace of Wall Street in this respect, the better.
But if you group all fiscons in one set for the sake of assigning blame for current circumstances, then very important insights about how to work our way out of all this will be lost. That’s tragic, and we as a nation simply can’t afford such partisan idiocy.
April 3rd, 2009 at 12:38 pm
Gingrich in the White House? That’ll be the day! His list of sexual escapades is just as long as Bill Clinton’s… but Bill Clinton never pointed the “finger of shame” at Newt Gingrich!
While I’m no historian, I’m fairly certain that “First Lady Calista Bisek-Gingrich” would truly be the first woman who slept her way into the White House. And on another woman’s husband, to boot.
Sorry, I just don’t see it happening!
Agnostick
agnostick@excite.com