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Gingrich and Barton Want You to Rediscover God in America

Submitted by Kyle Mantyla on December 3, 2008 - 4:24pm

Michelle Goldberg has a post up on The Plank about Newt Gingrich’s current foray into the right-wing culture war:

As I was walking out the door yesterday evening, the phone rang. On the line was a woman from something called the National Committee for Faith and Family, contacting people, she said, on behalf of Newt Gingrich. She asked me to hold for a message from the great man, I dutifully agreed, and was treated to a recording of Gingrich hawking a full-length documentary called Rediscovering God in America. Then the woman came back on, saying, "Do you think we need to stop the momentum of anti-God liberals and Obama?" She wanted a donation of $35 to distribute the movie, which claims that the United States was founded on religious principals, and that separation of church and state is a myth fostered by devious subversives.

"There is no attack on American culture more destructive and more historically dishonest than the relentless effort to drive God out of America's public square," Gingrich says in a trailer for the documentary on his website. Among the program's talking heads is David Barton, a former math teacher and Texas fundamentalist who has fashioned a career as a prominent revisionist historian, reinterpreting the American past along theocratic lines. Barton started out on the fringe--in the early '90s, he was a speaker at white supremacist Christian Identity conferences--but in the modern GOP, he's hardly an extremist. Indeed, in 2004, the RNC hired Barton to give get-out-the-vote speeches to groups of clergy nationwide. What's surprising is not that Gingrich would associate with Barton, whose work he's been praising for years. What's surprising is that, at a time of serious collapse on the right, Gingrich is hitching his bid for renewed relevance to the most exhausted culture war tropes.

Of course, Gingrich and Barton have been selling their “Rediscovering God in America“ shtick for over a year now, with Barton showing up to promote it during last year’s Gingrich-centric “Solutions Day” events and has been appearing around the county at various “Rediscovering God in America” events ever since.

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Newt Gingrich: Alternative Historian

Submitted by Kyle Mantyla on April 25, 2008 - 9:45am

Since leaving office in 1999, Newt Gingrich has carved out a lucrative post-Congressional career for himself as a speaker, a pundit, “citizen leader,” and possible presidential candidate, all while serving as chairman of his own organization as well as a fellow at various right-wing think tanks.  Heck, he’s even got his own avatar.

In addition, he’s also established himself as something of an “alternative historian,” writing novels that re-imagine everything from the Civil War to World War II.    So enthralled with the idea of alternate history is Gingrich that he’s even pontificated on an “Alternative History of the War since 9/11” with fascinating results.  

But now it seems as if Gingrich’s obsession with alternate history is starting to infect his other, more reality-based, pursuits. 

For instance, yesterday Think Progress caught him defending John McCain’s embrace of John Hagee, saying that McCain had repudiated Hagee’s anti-Catholic statements and that attempts to hold McCain accountable for Hagee’s offensive views was “grabbing at straws.”

Gingrich went on to suggest that McCain has adopted “the Ronald Reagan position” meaning that “People get to endorse me. I'm not endorsing them."

That’s a good defense - unfortunately, it’s pretty much the exact opposite of what Reagan actually said:  

The former actor, famed for his optimism and his ability to communicate it to the American public, was also famous for introducing many conservative Christians to real political influence.

Reagan was present -- and uttered one of his most famous lines -- at the meeting that many credit as the birth of the Religious Right, which molded evangelical Protestant conservatism into a cohesive political movement.

At the Religious Roundtable's National Affairs Briefing in 1980, after being introduced by a Southern Baptist evangelist as "God's man," Reagan -- then a presidential candidate -- told the gathering of conservative Christian luminaries, "I know you can't endorse me, but I endorse you."

Reagan's quip launched a relationship with conservative Christians that would eventually reshape America's political landscape.

Perhaps Gingrich should try to confine his fictitious historical yarns to his novels and avoid working them into his appearances as a political pundit.

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GOP Finally Getting Hip to Blogs?

Submitted by Kyle Mantyla on August 15, 2007 - 11:24am

The Washington Times reports that the Right and the GOP might have finally figured out that blogs and bloggers are valuable, noting that the Heritage Foundation's Robert Bluey has been hosting weekly "Conservative Bloggers Briefings" that have included people such as Robert Novak, Rick Santorum, and Newt Gingrich.

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Gingrich Skirts Armageddon Issue

Submitted by Anonymous on July 19, 2007 - 4:04pm

This week in Washington, DC, Pastor John Hagee’s Christians United for Israel (CUFI) held its annual convention to promote the religious-right’s support of Israel. Amid an evening featuring Gary Bauer and Rod Parsley and the bashing of the United Nations, European Union, State Department, and Jimmy Carter as enemies of the state of Israel, rumored presidential candidate Newt Gingrich provided a relatively innocuous keynote address. Well, relative in the sense that Gingrich outlined his hawkish post-9/11 worldview as opposed to discussing Israel’s role in the impending rapture.

Most of the CUFI constituents in the audience appeared to agree with Hagee’s views regarding the rapidly approaching judgment day.  As we highlighted earlier this year when John McCain was courting CUFI, Hagee’s apocalyptic foreign policy views aren’t exactly mainstream.  So what explains Gingrich’s presence at an event hosted by Hagee, whose judgments are shaped by a belief in a biblically predestined war between Israel and Iran, and the worldwide rule of the Antichrist in the form of the head of the European Union?

Gingrich, who offered up a slightly modified stump speech, making mention of the need for strength and perseverance in the face of war and references to the importance of America’s Christian heritage, is apparently looking to build right-wing support for a potential presidential bid without publicly embracing the conferees’ most extreme ideas.

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Dobson Seeks to Put Kibosh on Thompson's Bid

Submitted by Kyle Mantyla on March 28, 2007 - 1:22pm

As we noted the other day, James Dobson is a member of The Arlington Group, a secretive coalition of right-wing powerhouses that is throwing around its political power by interviewing presidential candidates in an attempt to anoint the eventual GOP nominee by granting said nominee its seal-of-approval.

At the same time, various polls show TV star and former Senator Fred Thompson doing quite well among Republican voters despite the fact that he is not even officially running. That apparently was frightening enough to James Dobson to compel him to make an unsolicited phone call to Dan Gilgoff, author of "The Jesus Machine: How James Dobson, Focus on the Family, and Evangelical America are Winning the Culture War," in order to decree that Thompson's candidacy is unacceptable because Dobson doesn't "think he's a Christian":

Focus on the Family founder James Dobson appeared to throw cold water on a possible presidential bid by former Sen. Fred Thompson while praising former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, who is also weighing a presidential run, in a phone interview Tuesday.

"Everyone knows he's conservative and has come out strongly for the things that the pro-family movement stands for," Dobson said of Thompson. "[But] I don't think he's a Christian; at least that's my impression," Dobson added, saying that such an impression would make it difficult for Thompson to connect with the Republican Party's conservative Christian base and win the GOP nomination.

Mark Corallo, a spokesman for Thompson, took issue with Dobson's characterization of the former Tennessee senator. "Thompson is indeed a Christian," he said. "He was baptized into the Church of Christ."

In a follow-up phone conversation, Focus on the Family spokesman Gary Schneeberger stood by Dobson's claim. He said that, while Dobson didn't believe Thompson to be a member of a non-Christian faith, Dobson nevertheless "has never known Thompson to be a committed Christian—someone who talks openly about his faith."

"We use that word—Christian—to refer to people who are evangelical Christians," Schneeberger added. "Dr. Dobson wasn't expressing a personal opinion about his reaction to a Thompson candidacy; he was trying to 'read the tea leaves' about such a possibility."

Dobson went on to say that Gov. Mitt Romney can't win because "there are conservative Christians who will not vote for him because of his Mormon faith," and that "the current excitement over Giuliani" will soon fade.

The only potential nominee for whom Dobson had any praise was Newt Gingrich, who just so happened to appear on Dobson's radio program a few weeks ago where he confessed to having cheated on his wife during the impeachment of President Clinton and claimed to have sought forgiveness.

While stating that he wasn't endorsing anyone, Dobson praised Gingrich as the "brightest guy out there" and "the most articulate politician on the scene today."

Despite Dobson's claims to the contrary, it is hard to see how this unsolicited call to Gilgoff could be considered anything but an open declaration of support for Gingrich.

Dobson has already said that he will not vote for Sen. John McCain, accused Thompson of not being a Christian, made clear that he doesn't think Romney can win, and declared that Giuliani's campaign is doomed. And since he is not out there praising third-tier candidates such as Sam Brownback or Mike Huckabee, that pretty much leaves Gingrich as Dobson's only choice.

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2008: Wash. Times Sees Gingrich in 'Top Tier'

Submitted by Anonymous on February 16, 2007 - 5:51pm

Iowa GOP dir.: “Everybody here loves Gingrich.” Gingrich: Running early is “stupid.”

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2008: Perkins Says Giuliani Has 'Got Problems'

Submitted by Anonymous on February 7, 2007 - 11:59pm

Like Potomac: “looks beautiful” but “polluted.” Other candidates criticized for “liberal bent.” Also: Gingrich’s back-door campaign features new policy outreach organization.

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Newt Gingrich: Time to Rethink Whole First Amendment Thing

Submitted by Anonymous on December 5, 2006 - 5:53pm

War on Terror means new speech limits, ’08 dark horse contends.

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Gingrich Applauds Voter ID Ruling

Submitted by Anonymous on October 24, 2006 - 4:53pm

In Arizona. Measure supposedly aimed at illegal immigrants.

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At Values Voter Summit, Potential Presidential Candidates Vied for Religious Right's Favor

Submitted by Anonymous on September 26, 2006 - 3:38pm

Family Research Council President Tony Perkins, host of last weekend’s Values Voter Summit, noted the appearance of prominent politicians Sen. George Allen (R-Virginia), Gov. Mike Huckabee (R-Arkansas), Sen. Sam Brownback (R-Kansas), Newt Gingrich, Gov. Mitt Romney (R-Massachusetts), and Sen. Rick Santorum (R-Pennsylvania) – all potential 2008 presidential candidates. And recalling the famous line by Ronald Reagan at the 1980 National Affairs Briefing of the nascent Religious Right – “I know you can't endorse me, but I want you to know that I endorse you” – Perkins writes:

The Washington Briefing, however, was not an opportunity for us to endorse candidates but rather an opportunity for candidates to endorse us and our values.

And indeed, sandwiched in between speakers shouting about “faggots” and telling electoral activists how to deceive their fellow churchgoers, these politicians expressed their admiration for the assembled. As George Allen said, “I want you to count on me as a teammate … as part of your extended family.”

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