Opinion: Ticket Replay: Newt Gingrich’s advice for the GOP: Go with your govs

This article was originally on a blog post platform and may be missing photos, graphics or links. See About archive blog posts.

At times over the next several days The Ticket is republishing some of our favorite items from this past political season. This item originally appeared in this space on Nov. 17, 2008:

Maybe you remember him. Newt Gingrich, the ex-Georgia congressman who took advantage of some serious Bill Clinton first-term mistakes to lead the historic Republican Revolution of 1994, was always brimming with ideas, some of them interesting.

He still is.

Apparently to celebrate the 10th anniversary of his resignation as House speaker after helping lead his party into serious off-year election losses, Gingrich is still offering more advice to viewers of ‘Face the Nation’ about future Republican leaders.

Last year without much public prompting Gingrich toyed with the idea of offering himself as a presidential candidate.

It kept him in the news for a couple of weeks. And now the party’s stark leadership vacuum offers another opportunity for publicity, especially if you say the magic words: ‘Sarah Palin.’

Sunday, after the Alaskan governor completed an intense week of media appearances despite her ticket’s decisive defeat, Gingrich was trying to play her down some.

‘I think that she will be a significant player,’ Gingrich says, ‘But she is going to be one of 20 or 30 signficant players. She’s not going to be the party’s de facto leader.’

Gingrich’s incomplete list of potential party leaders may be somewhat inflated. But it is interesting that the former House member agrees with many GOP backers that the desperately needed new leadership will come from the ranks of the 21 surviving Republican governors that have produced two of the last three GOP presidents.

Gingrich added: ‘She’s going to be a much bigger story in the short run. But, I think, as she goes back to being governor and as she works in Alaska, you’re going to see a group of governors emerge, not just Sarah Palin.’

Among those other governors he has in mind are Louisiana’s Bobby Jindal, who was also on the CBS program. He’s the 37-year-old son of Indian immigrants, a former House member who was mentioned as a possible VP partner on this fall’s ticket with John McCain; Also, Indiana’s Gov. Mitch Daniels and Utah’s Jon Huntsman.

We’ve added some relevant excerpts from the program’s transcript on the jump here; just click on the ‘Read more’ line.

--Andrew Malcolm

And to get automatic cellphone alerts of each new Ticket item, go here to register. RSS feeds available here under Top of the Ticket.

Excerpts of interview of former Republican House Speaker Newt Gingrich and Louisiana Republican Gov. Bobby Jindal on ‘Face the Nation’ with Bob Schieffer.

SCHIEFFER: All right, Newt Gingrich, do you think that there was any way John McCain could have won this election?

Mr. NEWT GINGRICH (Former House Speaker): Oh, in theory, sure, there were ways to win the election. But I think once the Wall Street crisis occurred and once you had President Bush on television for 18 straight days, it became extraordinarily hard.

By Election Day, President Bush’s job approval rating was between 19 and 23 percent, so McCain ran somewhere between 23 and 27 percent ahead of President Bush’s job approval. That’s a--I mean, you can’t ask a lot more out of a candidate than that.

But I think you’re interviewing one of the people who’s part of our future. When you look at the governors and you look at Governor Jindal and what he’s doing in Louisiana; and you look at Governor Mitch Daniels, who won by 20 points in Indiana while McCain was losing it; you look at Governor Jon Huntsman, who has the lowest employment rate in the entire West in Utah, and a billion-dollar surplus last year, about a $300 million surplus this year.

There are a lot of lessons to be learned out there, and everywhere I turn I find governors who are doing a very good job. Governor Mark Sanford of South Carolina, who just took over the Republican Governors
Association. So I’ve been through this. You know, you and I have been around long enough...

SCHIEFFER: Mm-hmm.

Mr. GINGRICH: ...I’ve been through the ’64 collapse when the Republican Party was going to disappear, and the ’74 Watergate collapse when the Republican Party was going to disappear, and
the ’92 defeat of President Bush.

And in each case, I watched us within a short time focus on new
ideas and new solutions, and within a very short time come back as a stronger and healthier party.

SCHIEFFER: So what happened, Governor Jindal, at the Republican Governors conference there, where you heard what Newt Gingrich just said, it turns out that Sarah Palin...

Gov. JINDAL: A lot...

SCHIEFFER: ...stole the show. Was that a good thing for Republicans?

Gov. JINDAL: Well, a couple things. One, I think it’s great for Republicans to have governors and others speaking out. We need as many--as many messengers. But it’s not the messengers, it’s the substance, it’s the message that’s important.

I know the pundits want to start looking at 2012. What’s more important is what the speaker said, he’s exactly right. Remember when he became speaker in the ‘90s? You had governors solving problems in states across the country, you had governors in Utah, Michigan, Wisconsin, for example, championing welfare reform.

You had Republican governors saying, `Let’s actually help people go back to work, help them get education. Let’s believe in the American dream. Let’s believe that every American wants a better quality of life for their families.’ Critics said it wouldn’t work. They brought those ideas to Washington, we saw the largest drop in poverty rates...

SCHIEFFER: Mm-hmm.

Gov. JINDAL: ...largest drop in teenage pregnancy rates across the country. I think the challenge for the Republican Party is to be gracious, work across party lines every chance we can, but to
stand on principle when we disagree with the new administration. But most importantly, to offer real solutions. I think governors can offer examples of what works across the country, and that’s what this RGA meeting was about.

SCHIEFFER: May--maybe my memory’s playing tricks on me, but I thought I asked something about Sarah Palin there.

Gov. JINDAL: Oh, well, sure, no, I think it’s great that Sarah Palin is speaking out. I think it’s great that the governors that the speaker mentioned were--are speaking out.

I think the future--I think the governors are going to play a great role and I think that, you know, our folks in Washington are going to have important work to do. But I don’t think all the answers and wisdom are going to be in Washington, DC, so I think it’s a great thing that she’s speaking out. I think...

SCHIEFFER: How do you feel about that...

Gov. JINDAL: ...we’re going to need multiple governors.

SCHIEFFER: How do you feel about that, Mr. Gingrich?

Mr. GINGRICH: Oh. I mean, first of all, Governor Palin is a real asset to the Republican Party. She brought enormous energy to the party. She attracted very large crowds.

But I would say, for example, the Republicans who are about to face this question of how do you get the economy growing again, bring in Governor Daniels and bring in Governor Huntsman and ask them, you know, how did they get to the lowest unemployment rate in their respective regions? Go back to a principled approach.

If you want to understand health care, you could do a lot worse than to bring in Bobby Jindal, who may be--may well know more about health policy than any other elected official in America and is doing an extraordinary job in Louisiana. If you want to look at education reform, you look at Governor Perdue in Georgia, you can look at Governor Haley
Barbour in Mississippi.

There a lot of people doing smart things. The natural pattern of the news media is going to be--they know how to spell Sarah Palin’s name, they’ve got it locked in the word processor. She’s going to be a much bigger story in the short run.

But I think as she goes back to being governor and as she works in Alaska, you’re going to see a group of governors emerge, not just Sarah Palin. And there are 36 governorships up in 2010, and I think focusing on rebuilding the Republican Party from state legislature and governor to Senate and House is the right model, and I think that the Republican Governors Association is probably more important than the Republican National Committee in trying to get this done.

SCHIEFFER: So you do not see her as the de facto leader in the party at this point?

Mr. GINGRICH: No. She’s a wonderfully intelligent, aggressive, hard-working person who got hit--you know, hammered very badly by the press in I think fairly distorted ways. But I think that she’s going to be a significant player, but she’s going to be one of 20 or 30 significant players. She’s not going to be the de facto leader.

SCHIEFFER: I want to run by a couple of statistics by both of you. In 1980, Ronald Reagan got 14 percent of the black vote. This year, John McCain got 4 percent.

Now, that’s understandable, you had the first African-American candidate and I think both of you would agree he was a very
good candidate who ran a good campaign. But look at the rest of this. Ronald Reagan got 37 percent of the Hispanic vote, George Bush got 44 percent; John McCain, 31 percent.

Ronald Reagan in 1984 got 61 percent of the youth vote, John McCain got 32 percent. Now, doesn’t that tell you that...

Mr. GINGRICH: Well, wait a second, Bob. Come on.

SCHIEFFER: ...you have been concentrating on the wrong things here?

Mr. GINGRICH: No, wait a second. You take Reagan’s greatest re-election in ’84 and McCain’s defeat and you compare them, and guess what? The guy who lost got fewer votes.

SCHIEFFER: Well...

Mr. GINGRICH: But that was Reagan’s greatest single vote. Now, I’d--look, I think we...

SCHIEFFER: But doesn’t that mean that you’re...

Mr. GINGRICH: Yeah.

SCHIEFFER: ...concentrating--haven’t you put too much emphasis on social issues here...

Mr. GINGRICH: Wait...

SCHIEFFER: ...and not enough on issues that...

Mr. GINGRICH: No. You know what the number one issue was this fall? The number one issue this fall was that the Bush administration had failed, OK, and that the Republicans in the House and Senate had failed.

This was a performance election. You’re a 20, 25, 30-year-old person and you look at this mess, and you say, `Gosh, do I like this attractive, new, articulate candidate named Obama who’s for--who’s for change we can depend on, or do I want to vote for the party that’s just been failing?’

Now, I think we have temporarily a big problem. I think if President-elect Obama is brilliant and committed and lucky, he might well consolidate that vote. On the other hand, if they watch what
you just had in the first half of this show, and you end up with Congress bailing out billions to failing companies and those 20-year-olds and 30-year-olds start to figure out they’re going to pay
the taxes, they’re not getting the billions,

I think you might find a lot of dissatisfaction by next summer.

SCHIEFFER: How about you, Governor Jindal? What about this bailout?

Gov. JINDAL: Well, I think the speaker’s right. I think the American voters, American taxpayers are rightfully skeptical. You go back to September, what we heard from Washington was it was
absolutely urgent that they pass this bill right away, and then since then we’ve heard multiple different explanations of how they’re going to spend this money.

I think taxpayers are right to say, one, we’re the ones that are going to be paying the bills. Secondly, they’re looking for competence. I think this election certainly shows us that the American people--I think we still live in a center-right country, but they’re looking for competence, they’re looking for real solutions.

To your earlier question, I think the Republican Party needs to fight for every single vote. I don’t believe that you win or lose elections based on identity politics. I think you build majority coalitions by showing that we want every single American to be able to live the American dream.

And I think we do that by offering real solutions. I think as we do that, we can do what Reagan did. He got those so-called Reagan Democrats to vote for a Republican candidate not based on party affiliation, but because he had the best ideas, the best qualifications to help them send their kids to better schools, earn more in their careers and have access to affordable health care.

SCHIEFFER: So what he is saying, and I think you agree, people voted against incompetence, not against ideology.

Mr. GINGRICH: I think that’s right. And if you look at the...

Gov. JINDAL: Well, I...

Mr. GINGRICH: ...senator--let me just say for a second, Bobby--if you look at Senator Obama’s campaign...

Gov. JINDAL: Sure.

Mr. GINGRICH: ...he’s promising a middle-class tax cut. That was a Reaganite position.

SCHIEFFER: All right. Well, gentlemen, I want to thank you both very much. Very much.