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by Jen Green

Elliot Abrams, former secretary of state under Ronald Reagan, charges in the National Review yesterday that when Newt Gingrich was in Congress he “attacked” then President Ronald Reagan over his Soviet policies. The tag line on the article suggests Gingrich repeatedly “insulted” the President back in the mid to late 80′s.

First of all, no where in Abram’s speech does he tell you that Gingrich was wrong in his assertions. What he does point out is that Gingrich did it “at the height of the bitter struggle with the Democratic leadership” over ”the fight over funding for the Nicaraguan contras.”

Also, what Abrams doesn’t report is that Gingrich was not alone in his criticism of the president. In fact, a veritable roundtable of then-conservative elites agreed with Gingrich: George Will, Charles Krauthammer, Irving Kristol, and Jeane Kirkpatrick all agreed with Gingrich’s assertions that although Reagan’s “rhetoric” was strong enough, his administration’s policies were “weak.”

Abrams also doesn’t recall in his piece all the glowing words about Reagan from Gingrich during this 60-minute speech from the floor. Hardly “insulting,” it’s instead a respectful encouragement for a popular president to put the actual administrative muster and policies behind his “great communicator” status.

Gingrich says, “Let me be clear: I have the greatest respect for President Reagan. I think he personally understands the threat of communism. He personally understands the history of Lenin’sadaptation of czarist secret police oppression to the new purposes of a Soviet governing dictatorship . . .[yet] the Reagan administration has a huge gap between its President’s correct visionary warnings of the transnational Soviet empire and the rest of the executive branch’s incorrect, ineffective fumblings and inadequacies. The burden of this failure frankly must be placed first on President Reagan; he is the President.”

Can the case be made that instead of being “insulting” and “attacking,” Gingrich actually pointed out the errors in a popular President’s policies (and in the end, he was proven correct) regardless of his feelings or the pressure of his own caucus? Can the case be made the only “insult” to Elliot Abrams was that a Republican congressman didn’t tow the party line and fall into step unquestioningly?

But don’t take my word for it. The March 21 1986 – Freedom’s Future- The Free World and the Soviet Empire speech by Newt Gingrich is here. You can decide for yourself.