NEWT GINGRICH GIVES NEW MEANING — NOT TO THE PROPER NAME BUT — TO THE WORD, “NEWT”
newt — /n(y)oot
noun
a small, slender-bodied amphibian with lungs and a well-developed tail, typically spending its adult life on land and returning to water to breed.
What a world we live in.
Every day it seems that some head-scratching event takes place which causes the lips to purse at the very least.
Usually a stronger reaction is elicited.
From the arenas of high-tech and social media and all they touch — to the havoc wreaked by the proliferation of handguns and assault weapons — to the crumbling education system — to the fight for women’s rights and equality — to LGBTQ issues — to the ever-widening racial divide — to climate and warming — to immigration travails — to senseless war — to the global quagmire exacerbated by the nauseating presence of the Trump regime — our noggins are on a swivel and even then we’re likely to miss something.
It’s nearly impossible to keep up.
To underscore our skewed perspectives, we make a habit of rewarding the wrong people for what they do.
Or don’t do.
Ever since the late (and great I might add) Marvin Miller, Executive Director of the Major League Baseball Players Association from 1966 to 1982, advised Curt Flood to challenge baseball’s reserve clause — a case which wended its way through the legal system until it was argued before the United States Supreme Court — and then encouraged Andy Messersmith and Dave McNally to test free agency, this country’s baseball players in particular and professional athletes in general have been grossly overcompensated.
Once the first dollar was overpaid the floodgates burst open. Over the years player salaries have skyrocketed.
While understandable in its singular context this prime example of misplaced reward becomes even more stark when contrasted with real world — and not entertainment-based — scenarios.
Those who put their lives on the line daily such as members of the armed forces, law enforcement officials and firefighters are paid a pittance as compared to ballplayers and other entertainers or show business luminaries.
Nurses and school teachers are woefully underpaid. First Responders, Security Guards, Secondary School Coaches, Medical Assistants, Recreation and Fitness Workers, Administrative Assistants, Real Estate Agents, Child, Family and School Social Workers, Agricultural Workers, Childcare Workers and Industrial Cleaning Workers get peanuts. As do Pest Controllers, Linemen and EMTs.
Joining the professional athletes in the overpaid fraternity albeit on far more modest levels are Research Veterinarians, Hotel Managers, Corporate Financial Associates, Meteorologists, Actors, Set Designers, CEOs, and Commercial Airline Pilots to name but a few.
Then there are our esteemed politicians.
What a racket!
The people we elect decide how, when and what to pay the people we elect.
To wit:
The salary of retired U.S. Presidents is $180,000.00 per year for life and for House and Senate members $174,000.00 per annum ad infinitum.
Ad nauseum.
But wait. We wannabes missed the boat.
Retired Speakers of the House? $223,500.00 per year for life.
Majority/Minority Leaders as they ride off into the sunset? $193,400.00 per year for life.
What kind of system is this and how could these figures possibly be reconciled with the average salary of a teacher which is $40,065.00/yr.?
Or with the $38,000.00 average yearly recompense for a deployed soldier?
Newton Leroy “Newt” Gingrich, born Newton Leroy McPherson on June 17,1943 in Harrisburg, PA. represents one of many prime examples of our misplaced allegiances and our endorsement of weak and questionable character.
If honesty were to prevail, he’s really nothing more than a blip on the screen, nameless and faceless were it not for his insatiable narcissism and unquenchable thirst for publicity along with his reasonably high intelligence, love of history and keen eye for able co-writers — see William R. Forstchen most notably.
(At last count, Newt had 72 books on Goodreads with which his name was somehow associated).
The former (50th.) Speaker of the House, a Trump ally and adviser, not surprisingly defends The Donald saying that he’s doing exactly what he said he’d do and describes him as “new presidential,” whatever that means — perhaps a veiled reference to the President’s incessant and annoying proclivity to tweet as well as to the fact that the Commander-In-Chief is a businessman, not a politician.
(Gingrich seems to revel in the notion that Trump skipped that step; he really likes that).
He has likened the Trump White House, in what he considers a tragicomic characterization, to a smash Broadway production.
“The problem they’ve [the Left] got is this is an off-Broadway performance of a show that is now the №1 hit on Broadway.”
In another inane stab in the dark Gingrich called for Madonna’s arrest in the wake of the pop icon’s comments at the Women’s March on Washington, labeling the singer part of the “emerging left-wing fascism.”
Clarifying a position which surely demanded no further clarification, Gingrich remarked on Fox & Friends vitriolically, “I love the left. When they say, ‘I dreamed about blowing up the White House,’ they didn’t mean, ‘I dreamed about blowing up the White House.’ They actually meant, ‘The yellow purple banana,’ but they didn’t want to say, ‘The yellow purple banana’ because it was too shocking. So they said blow up the White House. Give me a break.”
It is we who need the break Newt.
What a convoluted, baseless and senseless diatribe.
In his long and somewhat checkered political career Gingrich has been accused among other things of flip-flopping on issues and attempting to line his own pockets (by promoting and ultimately selling his books) while campaigning for office.
Sadly, standard operating procedure.
His personal life has been a bit rocky as well, multiple marriages inextricably intertwined with rampant infidelity.
Also not unique.
Excusing none of this, it’s his smarmy, holier-than-thou, condescending persona which pushes him over the top — or more apropos, drags him to the very depths — in the eyes of even the most casual, open-minded and thoughtfully objective observer.
As McKay Coppins of The Atlantic noted after spending some time with Gingrich:
“[He] is dabbling in geopolitics, dining in fine Italian restaurants. When he feels like traveling, he crisscrosses the Atlantic in business class, opining on the issue of the day from bicontinental TV studios and giving speeches for $600 a minute. There is time for reading, and writing, and midday zoo trips — and even he will admit, ‘It’s a very fun life.’ The world may be burning, but Newt Gingrich is enjoying the spoils.”
Whew!!
He is patently unlikeable, maybe even hateable.
Just like Trump.
The problem is this: there have been — and are — too many people in our country who love to hate.
And love the hateable.
[Editor’s Note: This piece was written by Mr. Kaplan in February 2017.]
