The New Chair of the RNC? It Won't Be Newt Gingrich

Posted by Steve Benen, Washington Monthly at 2:43 PM on November 11, 2008.

To the disappointment of Democrats everywhere, Newt Gingrich has decided not to seek the chairmanship of the Republican National Committee.

"A number of people have asked me to consider running for Republican National Committee chair. They have been very flattering, and I am very honored by their support," he said.

"However, my job as an American first is to develop a tri-partisan approach to developing solutions for the challenges we face. I use the word tri-partisan to designate the concept of attracting Democrats, Republicans, and independents to solutions that unify most Americans."

Yes, if there's one thing we know about Newt Gingrich, it's that he has no use for politics of partisanship and ideology.



* In 1994, after Susan Smith drowned her two young sons, Gingrich, just three days before the midterm elections, equated her crime with the values of the Democratic Party. Gingrich told the AP, "The mother killing her two children in South Carolina vividly reminds every American how sick the society is getting and how much we have to have change. I think people want to change and the only way you get change is to vote Republican. That's the message for the last three days."

* In 1999, shortly after the Columbine massacre, Gingrich argued that American "elites" bear responsibility. "I want to say to the elite of this country -- the elite news media, the liberal academic elite, the liberal political elite: I accuse you in Littleton ... of being afraid to talk about the mess you have made," Gingrich said, "and being afraid to take responsibility for things you have done, and instead foisting upon the rest of us pathetic banalities because you don't have the courage to look at the world you have created."



* Last year, after the shootings at Virginia Tech, Gingrich blamed liberals for supporting "situation ethics," adding, "Yes, I think the fact is, if you look at the amount of violence we have in games that young people play at 7, 8, 10, 12, 15 years of age, if you look at the dehumanization, if you look at the fact that we refuse to say that we are, in fact, endowed by our creator, that our rights come from God, that if you kill somebody, you're committing an act of evil." Gingrich, explaining the VT tragedy, went on to condemn Halloween costumes and the McCain-Feingold campaign-finance law.



"A tri-partisan approach to developing solutions for the challenges we face." Of course. How could I forget.

Tagged as: rnc, gingrich, partisan politics