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Charles Krauthammer To Bill O’Reilly: Newt Gingrich Is ‘A Victim Of His Own Creative Intelligence’

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As former House Speaker Newt Gingrich continues to gain a lead in the polls, much of the talk surrounding his run is the apparent opposition to his nomination from the Republican establishment. On tonight’s O’Reilly Factor, host Bill O’Reilly asked Charles Krauthammer precisely this, and before getting a serious answer on Gingrich’s Achilles’ heel, received a bit of a ribbing on the definition of “establishment.”

RELATED: Charles Krauthammer: In Order To Win, GOP Needs ‘A Candidate Who Is As Generic As Possible’

“Are you a member of the establishment?” Krauthammer asked, to which O’Reilly replied in the negative, as he was not one of those “people who wield fundraising power and are lifelong members of the Republican Party.” “Oh, that’s the reason you haven’t been at the monthly meetings we hold at the Masonic temple,” Krauthammer replied wryly, adding that “you’ve got to bring a live lamb and Karl Rove brings the incense.”

Getting down to business, Krauthammer then noted that there was, indeed, a fear that Gingrich was “too erratic or mercurial… a victim of his own creative intelligence.” “These people wonder,” he continued, “if he’ll wake up one morning the way he did in the past with a mandate or global warming… and surprise people by being unconservative.” The other concern, he argued, was that Gingrich was unelectable– so much so that “he would hurt the House and the Senate even.” Krauthammer argued that his political (not personal) baggage would not be overlooked in a general election.

RELATED: Newt Gingrich Responds To Glenn Beck’s ‘Progressive’ Claim: ‘Depends On What Standard You’re Using’

The segment via Fox News below:

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  • Anonymous

    GOP = Guaranteed Obama Presidency

  • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_OA46WV2JHSMWMO2VPYUXWZ4LPA Mandingo

    The establishment hate Newt, I think thats a good thing for him

  • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_GVWU6V6ORHYQ57UOHAEI52XTVU Dennis

    Bill O haters go crazy in 3…2….1…

  • http://twitter.com/mattparkerfl Matt Parker

    Newt is the GOP’s worst nightmare. Republican establishment types
    have every reason to be concerned about the late rise of Newt Gingrich.
    Here is a man that they thought had been disposed of, shuffling out of
    the national spotlight in disgrace and pimping for every major special
    interests, including those that opposed the GOP agenda, that came his
    way and paid him big bucks. Newt has been for a health insurance
    individual mandate, aggressive emission controls to combat climate
    change, and has stood against “right-win­g social engineerin­g” from the Tea Party in Congress. He is willing to embrace anything that advances his own personal fortunes.  http://www.sunstateactivist.org

  • Anonymous

    Asking Krauthammer about the GOP “establishment” is like asking Joe “bananas (there is no mafia)” Bonnano about all those bombings  forty years ago.

  • Anonymous

    I may disagree with krauthammer on a lot of things, but you’ve got to respect his intellect. 

  • Hout Bosques

    Nobody hates Billold any more – he’s too old, he’s like an old dog you’d shoot if you could but there’s laws & such & it’s kind of comforting knowing as annoying as he is, it’s so predictable it’s almost comforting. He’s so old & predictable & toothless, he gets to do the home-and-homes with Jon Stewart, that is, Billold is VOLUNTEERING to be a comic foil for Stewart (though not anymore for Colbert because Colbert cuts too close to the bone).

    Billold as ‘not establishment’, as ‘independent’. Wow, the guy’s got a gift for sharing a joke with the entire nation. No one actually BELIEVES you Bill, but we don’t care that you lie about stuff like that, you lie about practically EVERYTHING, so these ones are just harmless, reflexive things. And Billold playing dumb as Krauthammer goes through his list of problems the GOP establishment has with Newt, as if it’s all news to Billold – except … except … except he interrupts and stomps all over Kraut’s lines, sure in a gentle, collegial way, close as Billold can do such a thing, but it was becoming only too obvious to Billold that Kraut was headed towards the really sensitive part of the Washington GOP establishment dislike for Newt, what used to be called ‘wholesale whoring’, the part where Newt got caught with other Republicans; female staff, with staff who were daughters of constituents and supporters where things got fairly difficult, and then with other Republicans’ WIVES and GIRLFRIENDS, which is where oaths got sworn to drive Newt out of the House and out of Republican politics completely.

    See, none of THOSE Republicans saw Newt’s being in this contest as any less of a joke candidacy than Herman Cain, who they all knew pretty well, Newt & Herman being kind of the Republican equivalent of Ted Kennedy & Chris Dodd with their old-fashioned grappa & grapple womanizing. But now this has happened, and it’s opening up an awful lot of old wounds, and those wounds are just now starting to bring back real memories. 

    Thing of it is, though, the GOP knew two years ago it was playing with fire with this Tea Party thing, and now it’s like a bad case of herpes or some even worse persistent STD. The TPers outside of the establishment didn’t have their wives and girlfriends schtupped by Newt, they weren’t lied to right in their faces, they didn’t have to pick up the pieces each day form whatever impestuous ADD-motivated thing Newt had said the day before to the national press, and they sure as hell didn’t have to explain to their constituents why they all looked like idiots being out-moved day after day by Bill Clinton, and going after Clinton for impeachment over a freakin’ blow job.

    Yeah and Billold knows nothing about any of that. Sure.

  • Anonymous

    Yes. Right at the end of the segment Skeletor told us exactly what the Rethugs are all about, “lay off all of the working stiffs and steal all of the money.” That’s how Romney got to where he could wage $10 000 bets without flinching.

  • shonangreg

    No, he appears to be of middling intelligence, but in the circus that is the Republican Party today, Krauthammer speaks like he is an intellectual. He might actually be fairly smart, but having to ape the propaganda or a party or a cult really dulls one’s intellectual options. He has two arms and one leg tied behind his back. Maybe his hopping looks smart to you. I just think a man allowing himself to be so bound by dogma is anything but smart. Krauhammer has a choice; he chooses to be dumb.

  • Anonymous

    Yes. Right at the end of the segment Skeltor told us exactly what the Rethugs are all about, “Fire the working stiffs and keep all of the money.” Which how Romney made all his $$$ while at Bain.

  • Anonymous

    Bill is actually like an SNL version of himself these days. They must have upped his meds.

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Fred-Lee/100000182470888 Fred Lee
  • Anonymous

    Krauthammer looks like Alf  the 80′s sitcom

  • Anonymous

    The dude is a doctor and has won the Pulitzer. You are wrong.

  • Anonymous

    It was hilarious tonight watching O’Reilly try to convince Colmes the military wasn’t part of the government.

    Bent himself into a pretzel.

  • Anonymous

    Intelligent human beings are creative and do wake up with new ideas on a constant basis. That’s what gave us Steve Jobs and other pioneers of our generation. It’s not bad when politicians get to change positions every now and then depending on the times and circumstances. Rational human beings change their minds. Conservatives need to throw out this regressive “no thinking allowed” motto that has plagued their brand and pulled this country to the edge of the abyss far too many times where liberal or other non-down-the-line conservative ideas had to come and rescue it

    Were Gingrich not have been an ugly in conduct individual, he’d be moderates dream candidate precisely because of his predilection to veer off the beaten path

  • Anonymous

    Thing about Oreilly is he is predictable, which makes him boring.

  • Anonymous

    http://townhall.com/columnists/tonyblankley/2011/12/14/newts_past_and_future_leadership
    We don’t know what to make of events. We have not been convinced that either President George W. Bush or incumbent President Obama have had a clue about how to make things right.
    …But what kind of candidate is most likely to make sense of the terrible events and forces that weigh down our country; be capable of vividly describing our plight and what needs to be done; and convince the public that he or she has the intelligence, courage, experience and sheer willful capacity to force events favorably to America’s historic interests and needs?
    As I have chosen to phrase that question, the question answers itself. It is the GOP candidate currently at the top of the polls — my former boss, Newt Gingrich.But most Washington politicians don’t see it that way. They see a conventional, close election — not a bold, historic lunge by the voters to save the country. They suggest Mitt Romney may be better positioned to stitch together a safe campaign that noses out Obama by a point or two, or comes up short by a point or two. He might be that candidate.
    Thus, Romney received the endorsement of the GOP political types — congressmen and former congressmen. Now they are doubling down on their early bet and are out telling reporters that Gingrich was never much of a leader and never got much done.
    Curious. I remember most of them enthusiastically following his leadership year after year as the Republican whip from 1989-1994. It was the most successful congressional opposition movement since Benjamin Disraeli formed the modern Conservative Party in Britain in the mid-19th century. And after the GOP took back the House for the first time in 40 years (and the Senate, too, by the way), Gingrich’s four years as speaker proved to be the most productive, legislative congressional years since at least 1965 to 1967, and they were led by Lyndon B. Johnson from the White House. Working against — and with — Democratic President Bill Clinton, we passed into law most of the Contract with America, welfare reform, telecommunications reform (which ushered in the modern cell phone and Internet age), we had the first balanced budget since before the Vietnam War, we cut taxes and lowered unemployment to under 5 percent.Just who the heck do all these wizard political pros think managed all that? It wasn’t us clever staffers or many of the now grumbling GOP K Street crowd. We helped, but Gingrich led. I admit Gingrich’s methods were not orthodox. He modified the seniority committee chairman system and picked the best members for the key posts. More than a few feathers got ruffled.

  • Anonymous

    http://townhall.com/columnists/brentbozell/2011/12/14/newt_versus_the_ruling_class
    Newt Versus the Ruling ClassThe media elite and the Republican ruling class are remarkably similar in their political projection for the coming year. Journalists spent the entire year savaging every fast-rising challenger to Mitt Romney. The GOPs power pundits became equally agitated at the sniff of a conservative anywhere near the top of the GOP pack.
    ……
    I think they’re stuck in the past. The candidate that people now see is not the self-styled “revolutionary” of the ’80s and ’90s. He’s an older man, a wiser man, but a man that has a vision of both American history and the American future — and that’s what scares the establishment. Pundits like Noonan live to throw beanbags at conservatives on the set of “Morning Joe.” Oh, how they delight their liberal chums with a taste for GOP fratricide. Ari Melber of The Nation eagerly quoted Noonan’s “human hand grenade” line and mostly favorably compared Noonan to that liberal windbag Maureen Dowd of The New York Times. This is high praise in New York and Washington. The rest of the country could care less about Maureen Dowd.It brings us back to Angelo Codevilla’s piece last summer in The American Spectator titled “America’s Ruling Class.” What Codevilla called the “country class” — the party of freedom, as opposed to the “ruling class,” which resents the country’s input — has rarely captured the GOP flag. The GOP rulers sabotaged Barry Goldwater and were ultimately stuck with Ronald Reagan. Contrary to quaint historical rewrites, they were not in his camp. Instead, the GOP rulers bogged Reagan down with establishmentarian dealmakers and principle-shredders.

  • Anonymous

    He looks kind of scary to me. He has that same evil look as Dick Cheney. Krauthammer would be a perfect republican vice president.

  • Anonymous

    I disagree. Also try and read up on his views on things. He’s not as doctrinaire as you may assume. He’s a partisan but not an ideologue. I respect the guy, and I’m no conservative or Republican. I like reading what he says. 

  • The Real Royal Emperor

    In the land of the blind ….

  • shonangreg

    I will read more on Krauthammer specifically. Thanks for the suggestion.

  • Anonymous

    Comments such as yours, are the reason that nobody ever believes a democrat.  

    You can’t even spell the brilliant Dr.’s name right.  Know nothing  about him.
    Your comment about his arms and legs is disgusting.  The man is a quadriplegic fool.  

    I would venture to guess that he was more intelligent and articulate at 4 than you are at the present time.  

  • shonangreg

    seek456 wrote, “The man is a quadriplegic fool.” Wow! Why do you insult the man like that? You sound sick ;-)

    — seriously —
    Getting away from your own inability to punctuate, seek456, I did not know Krauthammer had injured his spine resulting in permanent damage. His wikipedia article doesn’t mention any long-term effects from his diving accident. I wouldn’t have used the analogy I did had I known that.

    You almost sound intelligent, seek456. Obviously my misspelling “Krauhammer” was a typo as I spelled it correctly in the same message. I’ve since corrected the typo.

    Are you capable of no substance in your disagreements?

  • Anonymous

    Charles is just another of the FOX commentators, like Ann and Karl, who can see the handwriting on the wall. This is not going to be a good election for the republicans. Ironically, Fox News gave cred to Newt, and now he is going to sink the republican party. 

  • Anonymous

    My initial assessment of your intelligence stands.  You knew absolutely nothing about the man and yet you “thought” you were fully equipped to weigh in on his “intelligence”.  

    ,,,,,,,, put them where you see fit and if there are some left over – hang them as earrings.  

  • http://mediamatters.org/ Leedog

    Newt had the Republican establishment worried!! Also, Bill-O hasn’t really been himself since his wife left him for another man a few months ago

  • Anonymous

    He’s partially paralyzed, you ass.

  • Anonymous

    I don’t want to live on this planet anymore

  • Anonymous

    Not when conservatives and independents hate him too. 

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