gosh I miss Newt
I Don't!
During his 16 years in Congress, Gingrich has inveighed vociferously against the evils of the New Deal/Great Society welfare state - while voting for every kind of welfare program imaginable: for the elderly, children, the "homeless," businessmen, farmers, bankers, left-wing broadcasters, etc. Those votes include: March 21, 1991 - $40 billion to begin the unconstitutional bailout of failed savings and loan institutions; June 26, 1991 - $52.6 billion for agriculture program subsidies, and food stamps; October 5, 1992 - $66.5 billion for housing and community development; September 22, 1994 - $250.6 billion in appropriations for the Departments of Labor, HHS, and Education.
Budget-Busting Profligacy. A Balanced Budget Amendment forms the core of the first plan of Gingrich's "Contract with America." He has been calling for such a measure and condemning deficit spending ever since coming to Congress. In an early 1982 speech he called on Congress to reject further increases in the National Debt Limit. "Only by using the debt limit as a leverage point" he bravely declared, "can we force the changes which clearly the liberal leadership of this body wants to avoid." Trouble is, a few months earlier, on February 5, 1981, he had voted with those same "liberals" to raise the National Debt ceiling by another $49.1 billion to $985 billion. He has gone this same route many times since.
Foreign Aid. If there is anything more unpopular, unconstitutional, counterproductive, fiscally irresponsible, and immoral than welfare for domestic freeloaders, it is welfare for foreign freeloaders. But the "tight-fisted" Mr. Gingrich consistently votes to send U.S. tax dollars to kleptocrats and tyrants abroad: June 27, 1990 - $15.7 billion in foreign aid for fiscal 1991; June 20, 1991 -$12.4 billion for fiscal 1992 and $13 billion for fiscal 1993; June 25, 1992 - $13.8 billion for fiscal 1993; August 6, 1992 - $12.3 billion for the International Monetary Fund and $1.2 billion for the "republics" of the former Soviet Union; June 17, 1993; $ 13 billion for fiscal 1994; September 29, 1993 - $12.9 billion, including $2.5 billion to Russia; August 4, 1994 - $ 13.8 billion for foreign aid for fiscal 1995.
Newt's "green" votes include: May 16, 1979 - the Alaska Lands Bill, locking up 68 million aces as untouchable "wilderness," December l7, l987-$307milion for continuation of the fraudulent and unconstitutional Endangered Species Act, putting the "rights" of owls, bugs, rates, snakes and newts above those of people; March 28, 1990 - elevating the unconstitutional Environmental Protection Agency to Cabinet-level status; May 23, 1990 - the badly misnamed Clean Air bill, requiring radical cuts in industry and automobile emissions, adding tens of billions of dollars annually in new costs to our already stringent and costly air standards.
Federalizing Education. The Communist Manifesto calls for nationalizing education, while the U.S. Constitution, to the contrary, prohibits federal involvement in educational matters. These votes cause on to wonder which document's philosophy is guiding Newt Gingrich's education policy decisions: May 10, 1979 - for creation of the new Cabinet level Department of Education demanded by President Carter and the radical National Education Association; May 9, 1989 - $1.4 billion in federal aid for "applied technology education," the new federalese for vocational education; May 16, 1990 - $2.9 billion for Head Start and Follow Through programs for fiscal 1991, rising to $7.7 billion in 1994; July 20, 1990 - $ 1.I billion for a variety of education programs, none of which the federal government has authority to fund; May 12, 1994 - "such sums as may be necessary" for the $3.3 billion-per-year Head Start program and $2.6 billion for fiscal 1995 for three low-income and child abuse prevention programs.
On July 26, 1990 Gingrich voted with the majority in refusing to support a resolution by Rep. William Dannemeyer (R-CA) to expel Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA) for felony criminal offenses related to his homosexual activities. He actively supported the re-election of Rep. Steve Gunderson (R-WI), an open homosexual, and praises Gunderson's "courage" for being "gay" and Republican.
Nationalizing Law Enforcement. On October 22, 1991, Gingrich voted for an amendment to the federal crime bill offered by Rep. David McCurdy (D-OK) to establish a National Police Corps. Although he didn't vote for the $30-billion Clinton crime bill of 1994, he resurrected it and helped make passage possible. As Rep. Susan Molinari (R-NY), one of Newt's cheerleaders, explained to Michael Kinsley on CNN's Crossfire, "If it wasn't for Newt Gingrich, you wouldn't have a crime bill."
NOPE I don't miss Newt.
