Newt Gingrich vs. Johnny Isakson on the fiscal cliff
One of two Republicans you know quite well is struggling with reality. Your job this evening is to decide which one.
On Wednesday, former U.S. House speaker Newt Gingrich, in a speech at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, Calif., declared the fiscal cliff to be a gross fiction, and urged House Republicans not to “cave” to President Barack Obama. From the Daily Caller:
“There is no fiscal cliff. It’s absolute, total, nonsense,” Gingrich said.
Former U.S. House speaker Newt Gingrich. (AP file /Jeff Roberson)
“It is an excuse to panic. It’s a device to get all of us running down the road so we accept whatever Obama wants because otherwise we have failed the fiscal cliff, and how can you be a patriot if you don’t do what the fiscal cliff requires, and the fiscal cliff will appear to us one afternoon, much like the land of Oz, where there will be this person hiding behind the machine who will say, ‘Raise taxes now,’” Gingrich intoned, “and if you don’t raise taxes you’ll have violated the fiscal cliff.”
“Now, do any of you want to be the person who stands up and destroys America by violating the fiscal cliff? Do you want to go on one of the national networks and explain that you are so reactionary, so out of touch with life, that you don’t care that America is going to die late on Thursday?” Gingrich scoffed.
The former speaker’s remarks called to mind a much-overlooked speech given by Johnny Isakson on the floor of the U.S. Senate earlier this month. You can watch it here, but I’ve transcribed the relevant portion. Isakson referred to the crisis as a “day of reckoning:”
”We’re in a very dangerous position. And I’ve been in this body one other time when we’ve faced a fiscal cliff. It was in September of 2008, and I will never forget it. The markets had been collapsing, the subprime securities had been collapsing, the world was in difficult financial times.
U.S. Sen. Johnny Isakson/AJC file
“The president of the United States – at that time a Republican – brought forward a plan to solve that problem, or at least to forestall the collapse of the market. …The House of Representatives rejected it, and the markets went down over 800 points in one day. Two days later, the Senate came back and adopted a plan to move us forward. The markets stabilized, but they were already at the bottom. They’d fallen by 50 percent…
“It’s one thing to gain the confidence of the world’s investors and body politics. It’s another thing to lose it. If you ever lose that confidence, if you ever go off that cliff and people no longer think this is the greatest place on the face of the earth to invest their money, then America has a harder struggle to come back than it would ever have by facing our problems now.”
“…We face a fiscal cliff. There are some in this chamber that say we need to go off of it. We’ll pay the price, and we’ll finally sit down and do what’s right. I would, with all due respect, say that’s pretty stupid.”
There is no smoothing over this. One of these two conservatives is remarkably wrong. Fortunately, we’ve devised a foolproof test to help you decide which one.
More than likely, you have a 401(k) account. It isn’t as large as you’d like, but you’ve been diligent and it represents a sizable amount of cash.
Now, imagine yourself in a room that’s empty except for a table, the former U.S. House speaker, and Georgia’s junior U.S. senator. You must sign over control of your retirement fund – all the money that will let you retire at 65 rather than 85 – to one of these gentlemen for the next eight weeks. Which one will it be?
Pick your man, and you’ve just decided whether the fiscal cliff is real or not. Because for small fry like you and me, our 401(k) funds are the chips in this very real game of poker.
- By Jim Galloway, Political Insider
For instant updates, follow me on Twitter, or connect with me on Facebook.
Tell us what you think about the site
Customer Care »
Vacation stops, manage subscriptions and more
AJC Services
Sections
Other Editions
Visitor Agreement | Privacy Statement
© 2013 The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
59 comments Add your comment
clem
November 30th, 2012
9:22 am
logic now that’s a hoot
Stick to the Facts
November 30th, 2012
9:30 am
Two things: Clinton era 1. tax rates? Ok if we also get Clinton era spending.2. Sens. Isakson and Cambliss are of the Dinosaur class of republicans, and you know what happened to the dinosaurs. They got a bit too comfortable in their environment, too.
jconservative
November 30th, 2012
9:41 am
As I recall the term “fiscal cliff” was first used by Mitch McConnell on the Senate floor a year ago.
The “cliff” is the result of two bills passed by a bi-partisan vote of Congress and signed into law by Obama. On taxes the bill was passed by Congress in 2010 and called for the elimination of all Bush/Obama tax cuts at 12:01 AM on 1/1/2013. On spending cuts the bill that created the “sequestered” cuts was passed in 2011 with bi-partisan support.
So if there is a cliff, it is a cliff created by Congress and the President. And if they are not able to agree on a compromise the tax increases they voted for will go into effect and the spending cuts they voted for will go into effect. If both are bad ideas why did they vote for both?
Georgia Politics, Campaigns and Elections – Galloway: who would you trust with your 401k? – Georgia Pundit
November 30th, 2012
10:15 am
[...] Galloway has come up with a brilliant test for whom to listen to regarding government finance. The setting is a disagreement between Newt Gingrich and Senator Johnny Isakson on how to address [...]
everydayjoe
November 30th, 2012
10:25 am
My rate was 23.8% last year and I paid it. I didn’t quit my job when my employer didn’t give me three paid days off to attend my grandmother’s sister’s funeral service, I didn’t quit when I felt disrespected and I didn’t take my vacation nor any sick days.
Why is it “Kris” thinks that I am the problem with America?
Observer
November 30th, 2012
10:53 am
Both of these lie every time they open their mouths. They have no clue to real life.I do not trust either of them and sure don’t believe anything they say.
LOGIC
November 30th, 2012
1:34 pm
@WOW. I am way over the election and was from the beginning when I knew what our options were – bad and worse and we definitely got more of the worse. BUT, I am not over the continued reach into my pocket to take care of slackers who want to spend other people’s money while they consider themselves too good to work and be responsible for their own actions. The need for the government to implement its compulsion of what my healthcare needs to look like, its desire to eliminate any incentive to be self-sufficient and free is in direct opposition to the U.S. Constitution.
This country and the wonderful 53% that is many concentrated in extreme pockets throughout the country has stated that it does not want to be self-sufficient and that we need to redistribute our wealth, our health and hell, even our morals because there is no “single truth” so lets agree that it is all true.
History has a brutal lesson for this socialist approach – ingenuity will die, the country will not prosper and the future of the next generation is stolen. Yet, all will be “equal.” I hope you are teaching the children around you that if we get an “A” in school after we study for a test that we should share that “A” with the kids who didn’t study because they were too busy goofing off. Start them young so that they can continue to vote your party line.
Village Idiot
November 30th, 2012
3:05 pm
Newt and neo-conservatives of his ilk are just as wrong now as they were when they refused to cooperate with the opposition party the last time a budget was being discussed. I hope they realize that governing means compromise this time, but, if they don’t, the American people will see them for what they are: self serving, greedy jerks who want to give our country away to the wealthy and to heck with the rest of us.
And as for all of the “job creators” who are angry because we now have a president who represents the middle and working classes, you can’t call yourself a job creator if you aren’t creating any jobs. If you are eliminating jobs, you are a job destroyer, and we don’t like people who destroy jobs in our country. It’s bad for the economy. Haven’t you heard?
The fiscal cliff is very real and voters will remember the politicians who took the country over the edge of it in the next election cycle.
Rabbit
November 30th, 2012
6:44 pm
Why does anybody care what Newt Gingrich has to day? He has shown himself to be a carnival clown on the order of “the Donald” and I, for one, wouldn’t enter an empty room with him, much less entrust to him a retirement account.