Newt Gingrich: Obama's 'Kenyan, Anti-Colonial' Worldview Rules America
David Gibson
Religion Reporter
Posted:
09/12/10
Newt Gingrich has unleashed some of his most explosive language yet against Barack Obama, telling National Review Online that a "Kenyan, anti-colonial" mindset governs the president's actions, which he blasted as "authentically dishonest" and "factually insane."
Gingrich's comments on the website of the conservative periodical were inspired, he said by a sharp-edged analysis of Obama by the conservative pundit, Dinesh D'Souza, in the latest edition of Forbes. In that article, D'Souza says that in his policies Obama is essentially channeling the soul of his late Kenyan-born father, an African "tribesman of the 1950s."
"This philandering, inebriated African socialist, who raged against the world for denying him the realization of his anti-colonial ambitions, is now setting the nation's agenda through the reincarnation of his dreams in his son," D'Souza writes of Obama's father, Barack Obama Sr., who the younger Obama barely knew.
Gingrich tells NRO that D'Souza's article is the "most profound insight I have read in the last six years about Barack Obama."
"What if [Obama] is so outside our comprehension, that only if you understand Kenyan, anti-colonial behavior, can you begin to piece together" his actions? Gingrich said. "That is the most accurate, predictive model for his behavior."
Gingrich added, "This is a person who is fundamentally out of touch with how the world works, who happened to have played a wonderful con, as a result of which he is now president.
"I think he worked very hard at being a person who is normal, reasonable, moderate, bipartisan, transparent, accommodating -- none of which was true. He was authentically dishonest."
White House spokesman Robert Gibbs seemed halfway between befuddled and bedeviled by Gingrich's critiques.
"I don't even have, quite frankly, George, the slightest idea what he's talking about," Gibbs told ABC's "Good Morning America" host George Stephanopoulos on Monday. "I think Newt Gingrich knows he's trying to appeal to the fringe of people who don't think the president was born in this country."
"You would normally expect better from someone who held the position of speaker in the House. But look, it's political season. And most people will say anything. And Newt Gingrich does that on a, generally, on a regular basis," said Gibbs.
Gingrich is positioning himself as a potential Republican challenger to Obama in 2012, and in doing so has tended to tone down the unbridled rhetoric that was his hallmark as head of the "Republican revolution" of the 1990s. Gingrich married his third wife in 2000, converted to Catholicism last year, and has been cast as the intellectual heavyweight of the GOP.
But Gingrich retains his penchant for the pungent quotation, and lately has ramped up his visibility and quotability on such issues as the controversial Islamic center proposed near Ground Zero.
Gingrich's latest comments also hit hot buttons about Obama's African heritage (his mother was from Kansas) and whether he is a socialist, and they play to suspicions among many -- especially conservatives -- about whether he was born in the United States (he was) and whether he is a Muslim (he is not) or a Christian, as Obama has been all his adult life.
"I think Obama gets up every morning with a worldview that is fundamentally wrong about reality," Gingrich told NRO. "If you look at the continuous denial of reality, there has got to be a point where someone stands up and says that this is just factually insane."
Gingrich apparently wants to be that guy.
Gingrich's comments on the website of the conservative periodical were inspired, he said by a sharp-edged analysis of Obama by the conservative pundit, Dinesh D'Souza, in the latest edition of Forbes. In that article, D'Souza says that in his policies Obama is essentially channeling the soul of his late Kenyan-born father, an African "tribesman of the 1950s."
"This philandering, inebriated African socialist, who raged against the world for denying him the realization of his anti-colonial ambitions, is now setting the nation's agenda through the reincarnation of his dreams in his son," D'Souza writes of Obama's father, Barack Obama Sr., who the younger Obama barely knew.
Gingrich tells NRO that D'Souza's article is the "most profound insight I have read in the last six years about Barack Obama."
"What if [Obama] is so outside our comprehension, that only if you understand Kenyan, anti-colonial behavior, can you begin to piece together" his actions? Gingrich said. "That is the most accurate, predictive model for his behavior."
Gingrich added, "This is a person who is fundamentally out of touch with how the world works, who happened to have played a wonderful con, as a result of which he is now president.
"I think he worked very hard at being a person who is normal, reasonable, moderate, bipartisan, transparent, accommodating -- none of which was true. He was authentically dishonest."
White House spokesman Robert Gibbs seemed halfway between befuddled and bedeviled by Gingrich's critiques.
"I don't even have, quite frankly, George, the slightest idea what he's talking about," Gibbs told ABC's "Good Morning America" host George Stephanopoulos on Monday. "I think Newt Gingrich knows he's trying to appeal to the fringe of people who don't think the president was born in this country."
"You would normally expect better from someone who held the position of speaker in the House. But look, it's political season. And most people will say anything. And Newt Gingrich does that on a, generally, on a regular basis," said Gibbs.
Gingrich is positioning himself as a potential Republican challenger to Obama in 2012, and in doing so has tended to tone down the unbridled rhetoric that was his hallmark as head of the "Republican revolution" of the 1990s. Gingrich married his third wife in 2000, converted to Catholicism last year, and has been cast as the intellectual heavyweight of the GOP.
But Gingrich retains his penchant for the pungent quotation, and lately has ramped up his visibility and quotability on such issues as the controversial Islamic center proposed near Ground Zero.
Gingrich's latest comments also hit hot buttons about Obama's African heritage (his mother was from Kansas) and whether he is a socialist, and they play to suspicions among many -- especially conservatives -- about whether he was born in the United States (he was) and whether he is a Muslim (he is not) or a Christian, as Obama has been all his adult life.
"I think Obama gets up every morning with a worldview that is fundamentally wrong about reality," Gingrich told NRO. "If you look at the continuous denial of reality, there has got to be a point where someone stands up and says that this is just factually insane."
Gingrich apparently wants to be that guy.