Newt Gingrich vs. Rick Santorum

The good news is that Newt also has an "Answering the Attacks" page on his site so we can hear it loud and clear from him [1]. So lets answer these attacks straight: 1. Relationship with Freddie Mac Recent reporting from Bloomberg News on the Gingrich Group's consulting services for Freddie Mac confirms that Gingrich and his firm were not paid to lobby and that Gingrich never acted as an advocate to stop any legislation or regulation affecting Freddie Mac. After leaving public office, Newt Gingrich founded a number of very successful small businesses. One of these small businesses, a consulting firm called The Gingrich Group, offered strategic advice on a wide variety of topics to a very wide range of clients. One of these clients was Freddie Mac. At no time did Gingrich lobby for Freddie Mac, or for any client, and neither did anyone in Gingrich's firm. This prohibition against lobbying was made clear to all Gingrich Group clients. Nor did Gingrich ever advocate against pending legislation affecting Freddie Mac, as some articles have incorrectly alleged. In fact, recent reporting from Bloomberg News on the Gingrich Group's consulting services for Freddie Mac confirms that Gingrich and his firm were not paid to lobby and that Gingrich never acted as an advocate to stop any legislation or regulation affecting Freddie Mac. Furthermore, as the New York Times documents, Newt urged House Republicans to vote against the bailout of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Newt is in favor of efforts to increase home ownership in America but as a conservative believes they must be within a context of learning how to budget and save in a responsible way, the opposite of the lending practices that led to the financial crisis. You can watch a video from March 2008 of Newt warning about the danger of politicized decision making in the housing crisis here as it is my first video I posted as well as the second. As part of Newt's Jobs and Prosperity Plan, Newt advocates breaking up Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and moving their smaller successors off of government guarantees and into the free market. [1] [2] 2. So why did Newt do the ad with Nancy Pelosi in 2007 calling for action to address climate change? Newt does not believe there is a settled scientific conclusion about whether industrial development has dramatically contributed to a warming of the atmosphere (third video). Through his entire career, Newt has supported pro-market, pro-entrepreneur, innovative solutions to our environmental challenges, which he believes are superior to the liberal pro-bureaucracy, pro-tax, pro-regulation approach to the environment. Newt believes that conservatives cannot be absent from the conversation about the environment and instead that conservatives must offer and explain why conservative solutions are better. Unfortunately, the attempt to get that message out through the ad with Nancy Pelosi failed. On November 8, 2011, Newt told FOX News' Bret Baier that doing that commercial with Pelosi was "probably the dumbest single thing I've ever done" (fourth video). Newt will continue to oppose the Democrats' destructive cap-and-trade and carbon tax proposals, continue to support expanded domestic oil and gas drilling, and continue to fight for a fundamental replacement of the job-killing Environmental Protection Agency with an Environmental Solutions Agency. [1] 3. Vote for Department of Education As President, Newt will dramatically shrink the Department of Education to a research and reporting overview agency, and restore decision-making powers to states and communities. When Newt voted for the creation of the Department of Education, the institution was only structured to provide research and collect data. Unfortunately, the bureaucracy ballooned, so while Speaker, Newt aggressively campaigned to pare down the Department back to its appropriate role and return power to the states. As President, Newt will dramatically shrink the Department of Education to a research and reporting overview agency, and restore decision-making powers to states and communities. Most responsibilities and positions will be eliminated, and its new role will be to help find new and innovative approaches to then be adopted voluntarily at the local level. Newt will steadfastly oppose any national curriculum standards, and will reverse Barack Obama's nationalization of the student loan industry. [1] 4. Healthcare Rationing/Donald Berwick Newt is deeply opposed to government imposed healthcare rationing and has consistently spoken out against it. He rejects the recommendations of the former head of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, Donald Berwick, for a system like the British National Health Service that rations the health care Americans can receive. Read the debate Newt had on rationing with Michael Rawlins, the chair of the British rationing board NICE, to see that Gingrich has always opposed any government effort to deny or ration care. Where Newt has praised Berwick was in the work he did with the Save 100,000 Lives campaign, which put forth solutions on preventing infections in hospitals; preventing deadly medication errors; and improving the treatment of patients who have suffered heart attacks. Newt believes Berwick's views on rationing care, however, are controversial and dangerous. [1] [3] 5. Mandate to Purchase health insurance Newt opposes Governor Romney's health insurance mandate, and Newt opposes President Obama's health insurance mandate. Newt believes mandates to buy health insurance are wrong on principle, and in the case of the Obamacare health insurance mandate, unconstitutional as well. With respect to President Obama's health insurance mandate, Newt believes it is an unprecedented and unconstitutional expansion of federal power. If the federal government can coerce individuals—by threat of fines—to buy health insurance, there is no stopping the federal government from forcing Americans to buy any good or service. It is a serious and unconstitutional infringement of individual liberty. With respect to Governor Romney's mandate, we have observed that it doesn't achieve its goal of providing low cost catastrophic coverage for the uninsured. The intractable problem we have learned from experience with health insurance mandates is this: once you have a mandate, the government has to specify exactly what coverage must be included in insurance for it to qualify. This introduces political considerations into determining these minimum standards, guaranteeing that nothing desired by the special interests will be left out. In the 1990s, Newt and many other conservatives, such as the Heritage Foundation, proposed a mandate to purchase health insurance as the alternative to Hillarycare. However, the problems outlined above caused Newt to come to the principled conclusion that a mandate to purchase health insurance was unconstitutional, unworkable and counterproductive to lowering the cost of healthcare. Today, Newt carries the banner in fighting for the repeal of Obamacare and advocates for a "patient power" replacement that will create a free market framework for healthcare, provide affordable, portable, and reliable healthcare coverage, and establish a healthcare safety net focused on those truly in need. This system moves us towards the goal of healthcare for all with no unconstitutional mandate of any kind. [1] (5th video) I have to stop now because I am running out of characters. However, all your criticisms are answered at Newt's site. 1. http://www.newt.org... 2. http://www.nytimes.com... 3. http://www.economist.com... http://www.youtube.com... http://www.youtube.com... http://www.youtube.com... http://www.youtube.com... http://www.youtube.com...