Newt at Cooper Union: Change the process….to much at stake.

Click here to see the archived version of the video. Our commentary follows:

Cue: Requisite University official.
Cue: Lincoln Scholar Hal Holzer
Add: Moderator Tim Russert, presenter of big ideas Newt Gingrich, and former governor Mario Cuomo.
End result: Serious adult discussion.

Taking the stage almost 147 years to the day that Abraham Lincoln spoke at Cooper Union in New York, former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich forcefully claimed that for the sake of confronting the challenges that he sees that plagues our political system we must change the way we elect our next president. With a keen eye that only a PhD in History could bring to bear on our current election process that he sees as a “full employment” system for political consultants, Gingrich declared that it is time for “serious adult discussion”. Her also lamented the last few presidential debates and commented that “we elect people to think, reason and lead….not memorize.”

Picking up on that theme Tim Russert said before the debate, “Let’s hope all the 2008 candidates follow the example set here tonight.

That example was 30 minutes of speaking by Mr. Gingrich and Mr. Cuomo and 30 minutes of direct questions by Mr. Russert. The debate was streamed online at the Americans Solutions website and can viewed here.

Speaker Gingrich wasted no time when he took the podium at 18 minutes into the discussion to call for changing the process. Newt proclaimed that he believes that, “our country has never faced more parallel challenges than any time since the 1850’s.” We face grave danger given that by all reasonable standards our political system cannot meet the challenge of solving them. Mr. Gingrich cited Hurricane Katrina and current immigration problems as two major examples.

But before we can start addressing those problems we need to change the process in which we elect our leaders and more specifically how we go about electing our next President. Mr. Gingrich in his 30 minute talk called for bipartisan events in key primary states to change the tone of campaigning. After the selection process is done Mr. Gingrich called for 9 ninety-minute debates from Labor Day till the election so voters can see the “maturity, knowledge and values” of the two nominees.
**********************************************************************
Later today we will update and comment on the three main challenges that Speaker Gingrich laid out at Cooper Union that we as a country need to focus on for the immediate future. Stay tuned.

Up next: Speaker Gingrich wraps up the CPAC conference Saturday night in Washington DC.

Posted by Mark Johnson at 1:46 AM | | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)