Newt Gingrich: I’m on Team Paul-Cruz

[Rocco]

Newt Gingrich: I’m on Team Paul-Cruz

Hah, very interesting. Probably good for Rand too when all is said and done.

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich said Sens. Rand Paul and Ted Cruz are among the few members of the Republican Party courageous enough to ask important questions, and that New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie represents an establishment growing “hysterical” over their strength.

“I consistently have been on the side of having the courage that Rand Paul and Ted Cruz have, and I think it’s sad to watch the establishment grow hysterical, but frankly they’re hysterical because they have no answers,” Gingrich said Thursday morning on The Laura Ingraham Show.

Gingrich was weighing in on an escalating war of words between Christie and Paul that was set off over their differing views on NSA surveillance of Americans. Gingrich told Ingraham that the party needs to admit that its national security strategy of the last decade was a failure, and Cruz (R-Texas) and Paul (R-Ky.) are leading the way.

Gingrich said though he supported both the war in Afghanistan and the war in Iraq, he has to “say the way that they were executed failed, and maybe we should have known better, those of us that supported them. … Republicans have a real obligation to ask themselves the question: Aren’t there some pretty painful lessons to learn from the last 10 or 12 years? Don’t we have to confront the reality that this didn’t work as a strategy?”

The intraparty squabbles popping up now are evidence of the discomfort, Gingrich said.

“Trust me, Chris Christie is only the first sign, the establishment will grow more and more hysterical the more powerful Rand Paul and Ted Cruz become. They will gain strength as it’s obvious that they are among the few people willing to raise the right questions,” he said.

Gingrich also said he wasn’t sure how much Christie knew about the issues, taking a shot at the man who has called Gingrich an embarrassment to the party.

“I think Christie is a very good governor of New Jersey, and I think that he is a very strong personality, and apparently in New Jersey tradition, he thinks bluster and strong language without facts can carry you a long way,” Gingrich said.



Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2013/08/newt-gingrich-rand-paul-ted-cruz-95053.html#ixzz2akWzGEES

 

[eduardo89]

He knows which way the winds are blowing.

 

[angelatc]

He knows which way the winds are blowing.

Exactly what I was thinking.

 

[Christian Liberty]

He's trying to tie Rand Paul to Ted Cruz.

 

[jkr]

THANKS M00NBASE!

all jokes aside, are we winning?

 

[anaconda]

He's trying to tie Rand Paul to Ted Cruz.

It seems like a lot of establishment insiders ostracized him in 2011-2012. Maybe he's trying to salvage something and hitch his wagon to the latest craze.

 

[tasteless]

A rat fleeing a sinking ship.

 

[jtstellar]

newt carries with him a lot of 'foreign policy hobbyists'..

they think geopolitics is some sort of sports game and they're all self anointed strategists.. people, self admittedly so, were drawn to gingrich because he always looked like he had some grand master plan under his belly, especially after his single debate victory against romney.. i still remember that gingrich supporter on fox' focus group that insisted gingrich had some kind of master plan saved for the last debate with romney and i think he used some star wars analogy.. jeez, i don't even know what you call this kind of people. it's like that not especially smart friend who thinks he's got all the wisdom in the world after he read sun-tzu one time.

remember people like o'relly and other gop'ers used to bitch back and forth about 'the surge' blah blah blah, micromanage this and that like they're all military strategy experts.. newt was drawing from an especially self aggrandized 'smart crowd' who talked about iraq like it's a blend between grand master chess and fantasy basketball

 

[FriedChicken]

A rat fleeing a sinking ship.

Exactly.
Newt is doing this for Newt. He feels he has something to profit by this - he is probably right. It would take a lot to convince me that his motives in ANYTHING he does were not selfish.

 

[eduardo89]

He's trying to tie Rand Paul to Ted Cruz.

More of this bullshit from you. Give it a rest.

Rand and Cruz agree on virtually everything. Rand is the one tying himself to Ted Cruz and vice versa.

 

[helenpaul]

we all have selfish motives. i welcome newts support of rand paul.

 

[FriedChicken]

I'll accept the praise and hope that it is useful in bringing more people into the cause of liberty but I'll never trust Gingrich and I really, really, really hope that he never has anymore influence than he already does.

I guess a part of me wishes he would have chose the losing team so he would go down to the realm of irrelevance with Graham and McCain ... cause this guy can't be a part of something he's not trying to run/take over/derail/corrupt.

 

[compromise]

I'm really surprised by his rhetoric regarding national security. This isn't the Gingrich I knew from 2 years ago.

Gingrich has always come off as someone who wasn't overtly ideological and do anything for political gain, but in 2011 he was a staunch defender of the Patriot Act.

 

[alucard13mm]

Newt can be US ambassador for the moon under rand presidency.

 

[Working Poor]

I hate myself for it but I kinda like Newt. This is not the first time he has come out in support of Rand. In the debates he did bring up some of Ron's talking points and may have possibly helped some people understand Ron better. He is a very articulate and talented speaker nobody can deny that

 

[FrancisMarion]

I hate myself for it but I kinda like Newt. This is not the first time he has come out in support of Rand. In the debates he did bring up some of Ron's talking points and may have possibly helped some people understand Ron better. He is a very articulate and talented speaker nobody can deny that

I agree with you. In the debates he even said, "Paul is absolutely right." If you watched them all you remember that.

This instance of a Gingrich statement and the last NSA Amash Amendment have me optimistic. Gingrich won SC in the GOP primaries last presidential cycle. Also every SC member of the house, that's right every single one, voted "Aye" to the Amash Amendment.

SC is starting to not look like the roadblock Ron hit in 2012.

 

[Brett85]

I'm really surprised by his rhetoric regarding national security. This isn't the Gingrich I knew from 2 years ago.

Gingrich has always come off as someone who wasn't overtly ideological and do anything for political gain, but in 2011 he was a staunch defender of the Patriot Act.

Newt is anything you want him to be.

 

[Sola_Fide]

He's trying to tie Rand Paul to Ted Cruz.

Yes. The establishment wants nothing more than for Ted Cruz to define libertarianism.

 

[CaptLouAlbano]

We'll see a lot more of folks like Newt coming over to support Rand and co. He is having a tremendous amount of influence and is showing himself to be the leader of a growing wing of the party, which very well could be the majority wing of the party in short time.

 

[FriedChicken]

I hate myself for it but I kinda like Newt. This is not the first time he has come out in support of Rand. In the debates he did bring up some of Ron's talking points and may have possibly helped some people understand Ron better. He is a very articulate and talented speaker nobody can deny that

I will definitely admit that many people share your view of him being a competent speaker ... but myself and others I know were never impressed with him even on that level.
I'll accept that I'm wrong though. If I were correct he wouldn't have gotten as many votes as he did. I just don't understand it.