WASHINGTON, Nov. 16, 2006
Good Riddance To The Gingrichites
CBS' Meyer: GOP 'Chess Club' Ruled The House For 12 Years And Won't Be Missed
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Former Rep. Newt Gingrich led the "Contract With America" crowd in 1994. (AP)
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This is a story I should have written 12 years ago when the "Contract with America" Republicans captured the House in 1994. I apologize.
Really, it's just a simple thesis: The men who ran the Republican Party in the House of Representatives for the past 12 years were a group of weirdos. Together, they comprised one of the oddest legislative power cliques in our history. And for 12 years, the media didn't call a duck a duck, because that's not something we're supposed to do.
I'm not talking about the policies of the Contract for America crowd, but the character. I'm confident that 99 percent of the population — if they could see these politicians up close, if they watched their speeches and looked at their biographies — would agree, no matter what their politics or predilections.
I'm confident that if historians ever spend the time on it, they'll confirm my thesis. Same with forensic psychiatrists. I have discussed this with scores of politicians, staffers, consultants and reporters since 1994 and have found few dissenters.
Politicians in this country get a bad rap. For the most part, they are like any high-achieving group in America, with roughly the same distribution of pathologies and virtues. But the leaders of the GOP House didn't fit the personality profile of American politicians, and they didn't deviate in a good way. It was the Chess Club on steroids.
The iconic figures of this era were Newt Gingrich, Richard Armey and Tom Delay. They were zealous advocates of free markets, low taxes and the pursuit of wealth; they were hawks and often bellicose; they were brutal critics of big government.
Yet none of these guys had success in capitalism. None made any real money before coming to Congress. None of them spent a day in uniform. And they all spent the bulk of their adult careers getting paychecks from the big government they claimed to despise. Two resigned in disgrace.
Having these guys in charge of a radical conservative agenda was like, well, putting Mark Foley in charge of the Missing and Exploited Children Caucus. Indeed, Foley was elected in the Class of '94 and is not an inappropriate symbol of their regime.
More than the others, Newton Leroy Gingrich lived out a very special hypocrisy. In addition to the above biographical dissonance, Gingrich was one of the most sharp-tongued, articulate and persuasive attack dogs in modern politics. His favorite target was the supposed immorality and corruption of the Democratic Party. With soaring rhetoric, he condemned his opponents as anti-American and dangerous to our country's family values — "grotesque" was a favorite word.
Yet this was a man who was divorced twice — the first time when his wife was hospitalized for cancer treatment, the second time after an affair was revealed.
Gingrich made his bones in the party by relentlessly attacking Democratic corruption, yet he was hounded from office because of a series of serious ethics questions. He posed as a reformer of the House, yet championed a series of deforms that made the legislative process more closed, more conducive to hiding special interest favors and less a forum for genuine debate.
And he did it all with epic sanctimony.
These squirrelly guys attracted and promoted to power similarly odd colleagues: birds of a feather, you know, stick together. Bill Clinton of Monica Lewinsky fame had no more zealous and moralistic critic than Rep. Dan Burton of Indiana, who ran a then-powerful committee. In the course of his crusade, Burton was forced to admit he had actually fathered a child in an extramarital affair.
The man who led the House Judiciary Committee impeachment hearings with equal, if saner, bloodlust was Rep. Henry Hyde. In the midst of this, Hyde was forced to admit to a five-year affair.
When Gingrich stepped down, Republicans turned to a master Louisiana pork-barreller, Robert Livingston. That lasted a day or so, until Livingston (you guessed it) admitted to having extramarital affairs.
Livingston was succeeded by Dennis Hastert, perhaps the most, well, conventional of the GOP leaders of his era. Still, Hastert was a hawk with no military service and a defender of the rich with no money or experience in business.
In this year's election cycle, House Republicans were justly vilified for their subservience to the corruptions of Jack Abramoff and Tom DeLay's entire K Street project. While extreme, there have been many other periods of extreme corruption in Congress.
What marked this Republican cadre was not their corruption, but the chips on their shoulders.
It was a localized condition. It didn't spread to the Senate. The Republican leaders there — again, suspend your ideology and just look at biography — were pretty typical American politicians.
Bob Dole, Trent Lott and Bill Frist were not acting out in office. They were not ideologues and did not use the rhetoric of the righteous. The colleagues that wielded the most power — like McCain, Simpson, Lugar, Specter, Stevens, Warner — have had long runs of service in several arenas relatively free of public and private embarrassment and hypocrisy — and even some substantial accomplishments pre-Senate.
History reveals that great leaders and intellectuals often appear in clusters, inspiring and motivating each other to extraordinary achievement. American historians have focused on this in recent books looking at the "founding brothers," Lincoln's "team of rivals," the 19th-century pragmatist philosophers called "the metaphysical club," Roosevelt's New Dealers and Kennedy's "best and the brightest."
The opposite is also true.
What's next for the House is of course uncertain, but an undistinguished chapter has come to a close. Good riddance.
Dick Meyer is the editorial director of CBSNews.com, based in Washington.
E-mail questions, comments, complaints, arguments and ideas to
Against the Grain. We will publish some of the interesting (and civil) ones, sometimes in edited form.
By Dick Meyer
©MMVI, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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See all 119 CommentsMr. Meyer, I have enjoyed your column for a very long time - but I have to agree with the critics of the media when they ask "where were you?". The fourth estate has totally bought into the Republican propaganda of being liberally biased to the point that they censor themselves and thus short-change the public on reporting the state of the country and the "statesmen" running it.
It's safe now to bash the party no longer in power, but Mr Meyer - Where were you when we needed you?
And I always wondered why someone would name their kid "Newt."
Many thanks to him and to CBS for allowing the public to place their comments on these pages. People should realize that it is a wonderful privilege to be able to do this.
Are you able to independently dispute any of Myer's statements? If not, your comments are nothing more than "shoot the messenger".
You obviously feel that blatant corruption (both financial and moral) are qualities we should tolerate in our elected officials, as long as they are Repubs.....
It is disheartening how it took a flood of books written about the fiasco in Iraq before the MSM began to report on dissenting opinions in the military, as just another example of how the mainstream news organizations have morphed into parade followers under corporate rule. I don't watch Katic Couric since CBS put Rush Limbaugh on "the News" and I don't read ABC's The Note since I realized its a right wing screed. I wish the Bosses in the news division realized why people are turning their TVs off in droves, and seeking their news on the 'net. Anyway, thanks Mr. Meyer. Your column keeps me coming back to this site.
I agree completely. It is really sad because the media in large part is responsible for all the mess that has been created in our country certainly in the last 6 years.
They bought and spewed out this complete right wing *** like it was actually the truth.
You obviously have one of the shortest selective memories of the MSM. Where were you when we had the scandals of Condit (murder suspect), Frank (influence peddling), Brown (caught taking money keeping it in his freezer), Kerry (I voted for it before I voted against it), Feinstein (I carry but you can't), Kennedy (influence the election) , and don't forget Gore (no legal moral authority) and the all-time philanderer in chief Slick Willy??? This type of activity is pervasive on both sides of the aisle, you simply forgive the Dems and persecute the Republicans. Get a dose of reality, throttle back alittle on the drugs and use the talent you were given, to find these warts on the american political backside, to keep the rascals honest. Watermark these factors at the end of the Rebulican Chess Clubs reign; Inflation, tax revenues, the DJIA, unemployment, oil prices and see where they are after a couple of years under the new management, there the numbers won't lie but you can bet the politicians will.
Mr Meyers, we all await your candidacy for any elected office (like the ones of those you arrogantly condemn) so we all can see you do a better job than any of them and not just talk about it.
If you don't like my comments here (particularly if you receive them as ridicule, when they are not), I suggest you don't run for office and get your feelings really hurt. Actions versus words. Give us all some actions from Y-O-U to look at and not just words about how things could be better. Get America on track to do whatever Y-O-U suggest. That is the job of an elected official, is it not?
Actually, the Nazi salute was inspired by the original American flag salute. Those of you who are old enough will remember how it was done before world war two. If you don't believe me, look up the pledge of allegiance on Wikipedia and look at the picture of the children saluting (ignore the incorrect explanation which does not match the picture).
The basis for Nazi philosophy (including eugenics) was developed in the United States and found an audience in Germany. The real inconvenient truth is that Nazi values were made in America, and we should not be surprised that they still form an undercurrent in this country.
So, yes, I deplore the immoral hypocrites in our government. They are leading us down the road to destruction. But as long as people elect them, the people get what they deserve.
H-E-L-L NO!
The CBS spin machine is running full speed.
When CBS News is shut down permanently, over half of America will say "good riddance".
You are the king of weirdos, Dicky Meyers!!
I find it interesting that you do not consider insult (calling someone arrogant and bitter) to be a form of ridicule........
Anyway, if I were a Republican (as frenchie777 clearly is), I'd be just as happy as Mr. Meyer that the House Republican leadership is now free of bellicose, hypocritical, and wholly uninspiring characters such as Gingrich, Foley and Delay.
But then again, I've always had a hard time understanding the Republicans....
you have it wrong; it goes: those who can, do; those who can't "work" in government.
please read below.
It is not an easy task trying to determine who would make a good pol. I do my homework.
With all the bad marks, corruption, pork, graft, arrogance, looking down on us from their ivory towers, I determine who should be excluded from eating at the government trough.
Gingrich is one fat cat who, thankfully, is gone.
For education:
Make parents responsible for their children's values instruction instead of dumping it on the school system then prayer in school won't be an issue. If Mom and Pop want it, let them pay for sports to happen on weekends. Use the schools for education. Plop the little dears into uniforms so Pop's wallet is less of an issue. Provide a decent liberal education where teachers teach reading, writing, and arithmetic along with a little science, music, and art so our kids know how to make wise political choices [because it's apparent none of us do.]
Infrastructure:
Bring jobs back home along with our troops. Do away with NAFTA and close our borders. Rebuild our highways instead of worrying about Iraqs. Worry less about gay marriage and more about serial monogamy - cut down the divorce rate, fewer women will be forced into poverty. Penalize doctors for performing abortion instead legislating morality for women. Instead of rushing off to Guatemala, China, Africa to adopt babies, adopt some of the thousands of children in the U.S. who need homes. Side note: close down foster child placement agencies who milk government for millions and increase stipends to decent human beings who wanted to raise kids who have been physically and emotionally abused.
Whew! How's that for a liberal?
where was cbs news the last 6 years. hiding behind the we're afraid to be painted with the un-patriotic post 9-11 paintbrush?
where were the editorials seriously questioning what the conservative ideologues were doing?
when they wrecked the economy under reagan and bill clinton rescued us with sound centrist policies....what did the newt-ites do? they could not point to a 'we told you so' on their warnings of the dire consequences of clinton's solutions. t hey had to attack his morals, but of course people in glass houses shouldn't throw stones and as is often the case it bites them tight back.
bravo for your honesty, but where was cbs back then? and during the last 6 years?
I agree. If CBS and the rest of the media had spoken up instead of being afraid maybe the country would not be in the mess it's in and 3000 people killed in NY would not have been followed up with upwards of 3000 (American) needless deaths in Iraq
I must say it is very refreshing seeing a liberal take a shot at discussing actual policy vs throwing around weird conspriacy theories. And hate for the other party. But when I start looking at your little attempt at policy I would argue that many of those sugestions are not very liberal at all.
"Penalize doctors for performing abortion instead legislating morality for women. '" sounds like a very liberal policy indeed.
SEE look at "tejasdemo"! theres a real liberal..take a little point of contention and spin it so we are discussing something irrelevant like the meaning of liberal..obviously within the context of this discussion we were using an understood paradigm of republican/liberal to form our argument. I do not see what you nit picking was accomplishing. But way to illustrate my point. This is the exact kind of reasoning and argument used by liberals who do not want to discuss specific policy or substance but want to twist and turn and put irrelevant holes in arguments without making their own. Priceless.
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