“I’m on the way to a Gingrich press conference”
Newt Gingrich made between $1.6 million and $1.8 million in consulting fees from two contracts with mortgage company Freddie Mac, according to two people familiar with the arrangement.
The total amount is significantly larger than the $300,000 payment from Freddie Mac that Gingrich was asked about during a Republican presidential debate on Nov. 9 sponsored by CNBC, and more than was disclosed in the middle of congressional investigations into the housing industry collapse.
Gingrich’s business relationship with Freddie Mac spanned a period of eight years…
Gingrich said this morning that the payments were for “strategic advice over a long period of time.” His fees were sent to his consulting firm, The Gingrich Group, not to him personally…
Gingrich’s first contract with the mortgage lender was in 1999, five months after he resigned from Congress and as House speaker…His primary contact inside the organization was Mitchell Delk, Freddie Mac’s chief lobbyist, and he was paid a self- renewing, monthly retainer of $25,000 to $30,000 between May 1999 until 2002, according to three people familiar with aspects of the business agreement.
During that period, Gingrich consulted with Freddie Mac executives on a program to expand home ownership, an idea Delk said he pitched to President George W. Bush’s White House.
A reflection of the cesspool that is Congressional ethics.
Who goes to Washington DC to help Americans? They get elected for all the perks that makes them wealthy. If anyone watched the 60 minutes program you would understand the severity of elected officials. Its all about making a buck for most of them .Democrat’s or Republicans. It does not matter. What matters is that their is legal corruption going on because Congress makes up the rules for themselves. Who ever thought this was a good ideal should be shot.
Fraudulent headline. The 1.6 million was for 8 years, not monthly.
No doubt Eid forgot that Republicans aren’t up to 6th grade math. Or that they would RTFA.
Are you defending Newt?
The headline is stating he was paid monthly for his advise
and the 1.6 Mil is the total paid. What a gig for giving advise to an organisation he blasts constantly.
The headline says the “monthly retainer = $1.6 million total”.
That is a hell of a lot different than the “monthly retainer = $17 thousand total”.
Are you serious?
“Gingrich admits Freddie Mac kept him on monthly retainer = $1.6 million total”
He was kept on a monthly retainer, for a total of $1.6MM paid, can this be any clearer? Sure! RTFA, where it says “Newt Gingrich made between $1.6 million and $1.8 million in consulting fees from two contracts with mortgage company Freddie Mac, according to two people familiar with the arrangement.” Misleading? Nope.
Like a good Republican, he’s deflecting the discussion from GOP corruption to a blog math error.
Why don’t you complete the story?
Why don’t you tell everyone how he told Freddie Mac that they couldn’t continue like they were, that he told them to stop giving homes to people who couldn’t afford it? …That he continually gave them fiscally sound advice which was summarily ignored.
I don’t mind a good hard-hitting story when its true, but you didn’t do your homework, and you didn’t follow through. I hope JCD schools you for it.
Look, look, another True Believer in Republican press conferences.
Press conference? Try bloody history… this is old news to those who actually paid attention. Some of us don’t need to wait for the media to tell us what to they think we should “know”.
Oh gosh diggley darn it. Leave poor Newt alone. He was just trying to straighten out Freddie not lobby on their behalf with Republicans on the hill.
“None of the former Freddie Mac officials who spoke on condition of anonymity said Gingrich raised the issue of the housing bubble or was critical of Freddie Mac’s business model.”
Of course he didn’t raise any issues. He was there to have coffee and discuss Cheney’s latest shooting victim.
The issues crap was a blind so he could tell congress he was looking into things, and keep everybody else off his turf.
Meanwhile … he was raking it in for a “no work” job.
I think the Dvorak editors take their lead from MSNBC talking heads.
Lately, all the conservatives say that when confronted with some truth and reality. It’s their only defense.
It was Gingrich who revised Congressional ground rules that enabled the qualitative expansion of lobbying – along with relaxing regulation of the ethics of lobbying. What little there was.
Republicans and Democrats socking it away owe him a vote of thanks.
Love the recent picture of Newt. I’m a bit surprised Newt is getting reheated to challenge the Mormon but admit he’s more ‘electable’.
Cain going down.
..on the down swing since admitting slipping his hand up several white woman’s skirt…
Then, he does this :
http://news.yahoo.com/cain-says-god-persuaded-him-run-president-204548374.html
Then this…
http://youtube.com/watch?v=WW_nDFKAmCo
Good lord. I wonder if he was attempting to deflect his sexual misconduct by being a buffoon? Didn’t work.
Buffoonery can get some Texans elected. Cain’s not from the lone star state, so he is a just a flavor of the month.
Black Walnut. Limited flavor from Haagen Dazs.
LOL….but really, I believe his religious “God made me do it” weirdness was to have the press focus on THAT instead of sex issue.
The Libya thing was a hilarious.
I now believe Newt has a chance if settles down and not come across as a major league asshole. I can tell he’s trying hard with recent interviews.
Now that he’s back in circulation, the reporters will bait him to see if he blows up like Trump.
This is the BEST campaign comedy yet!
Headline of the Week, at Crooks & Liars:
Confirmed Serial Adulterer Passes Alleged Serial Harasser in GOP Race
Hmm. The Business Week article reads like Gingrich and George W and Delk sat down and decided sleazy over-leveraged loans to Hispanics would get more Republican votes.
Now, that their bubble has crashed, the obvious drill is to blame those who took out the loans and the authors of the original legislation.
Golly. Are we to believe Republicans are hypocrites?
As hypocrites as the Dems.
Quit apologizing your party’s corruption practices with your usual “neener neener, they do it too”
I know you are a sheeple and really don’t know how to read but I really want to know where in my reply am I apologizing for the reps?
Don’t worry, I won’t be waiting for an answer
You sad sheeple. The correct answer for you should have been:
“Yes, the GOP is corrupt indeed and I’m embarrassed to have voted these criminals into office. I’m therfore indirectly responsible for the shithole economy we have and the debt burden I have passed down to current and future generations.”
Still speaking about you in the third person? Creepy.
You delivered as expected: with a non-answer.
I equated Rep filth with your Dem filth. Same shit, different name.
Keep deflecting, moron!
All politicians (today) are in it for the love of money, power and pussy.
Though none of the moderators of these so-called debates has had the balls to ask who rejects evolution and the science behind it, it’s liable to come up sometime or other.
Anyone recall what Newt’s answer was in ’08?
We all know what it will be this time, round.
He’s smart as a whip and engineered the partisan negative approach to congress which brought the Republicans back to relevancy. He’s also got 20 years of ethics and personal problems.
His biggest problem? Americans don’t like their leaders to be angry, thin skinned and humorless.
Man, the Republican candidates are crap which is letting Romney skate away with it.
You know, at least the universe is till rational. Not moral, but rational. Its obvious the intelligent honest Republicans evaluated the scene and decided they could not beat Obama so they are saving their powder for 2016. That did leave the way open only for charlatans, fools, hucksters, dogmatic ideologues, and carpetbaggers.
You match them up.
Haw, HAW!!!!!! – - Same as it ever was.
PS–did you catch the double talk? Michele Bachman did, kudos to her. Newt affirmatively stated that Congress needed to stop playing games with Social Security and to leave the funding/program alone. THEN he said the employee contribution to Soc Sec should continue to be forgiven. Moderator asked if everyone agreed with that. Everyone did except Michele. She said that was going to create a crises down the road.
Imagine that? I never said they were perfect fools. Just mostly.
I miss the comment numbering too. But if everyone did it themselves, there would be conflicts (repeats of numbers). The blog has to be the official numberer, or nothing. Unless you prefix a number with your name. Like “Bobbo-1″ and so on, as you revisit and comment a topic. But not a self made total comment count.
Aw, you miss numbers. Go watch some Sesame Street. I heard it’s good at teaching kids like you the numbers.
Funny that the media makes this a big issue just as Newt starts leading the polls. How much have they focused on the Democrats who made millions if not tens of millions on the boards of these organizations? Jim Johnson? Franklin Raines? 9/11 commission member who covered up TWA 800 Jamie Gorelick?
Good point, Newt has been irrelevant until now, so why waste a good story on an irrelevant former politician.
So anyway, which of those Dems is running for president?
So, will the Freddie Mac bail out blunder of Newt, be his Herman Cain sexual harassment claim? And will it be the straw that brings Perry’s poll numbers back up? I’m still wondering what the Bilderburg backed media will pull to improve their favored son’s chances at the White House?
Plus I really can’t see the US ever having a President Newt.
Well, it seems that Newt’s ascension is a good thing, what with Herman’s Cain saying shit like this:
This is quite a shock! Until now, I was convinced of Newt’s sterling character.
Only 1.6?
This guy’s a piker compared to the rest of them on the Hill.
A young Wessex Saddleback. Known for its very docile nature and good mothering ability.
John Edwards working for hedge funds for millions was largely ignored. He gave a similar story as Newt, something that he was learning about poverty.
James Johnson headed Obama’s VP search committee for awhile, and Franklin Raines was an Obama adviser, and these guys didn’t just make 1 or 2 million, but more like 100 million.
Yep, Gingrich is a low-level douche bag, a rank amateur compared to the douches-in-charge at the moment.
But still a douche.
Hey, McCullough.
A douchebag? At least a douche clears things out and makes them sweet smelling. What do you say to A company is a big political donor and one of it’s employees leaves the company to go to work for the gov and then helps the company get almost a billion and half of our tax dollars? I call that a democrat. They can only aspire to douchebaggerie.
http://bit.ly/uD7gtf
Interesting how you Democrats go apeshit attacking any Republican who appears to be gaining ground. Simply amazing. You appear to be terrified that the sock monkey won’t get re elected. Funny, that.
#40–Animby==I see you are often motivated to post when someone else needs to be corrected? I value all such posts. How come you don’t post every time I do? Ha, ha. What did George Carlin call “Its actually a nice word?” All goes to the misogynistic culture we live in. Imagine calling a douchbag a bad thing. Its like calling contraceptives baby killers. Who would do that?
#18.1–Glenn. Thank You. Yes, the numbers FACILITATE reading this blog. Imagine the motives of a blog master not wanting anyone to read his blog? Sound implausible? I can make it make sense, I just don’t know if it is true.
Don’t make the Perfect the enemy of the good/better. I key my post off the number of comments block. That can still be off, but not by much. The errors that would be present would still be workable with less time spent trying to find what you want compared to no numbers at all.
To each his own. I do miss my nom de flame though. May have to give up being one kind of meaningless pest for another==like Pedro. Always number two in my book, if you know what I mean.