After reading most of the negative reviews, I've come to the conclusion that many of these deal more with a personal grudge against Newt Gingrich, rather than with the contents of the book. This review will, on the whole, I'm afraid, be a negative review: I did not find the book particularly interesting, and I will try to explain my reasons for this. Gingrich's biography has a role to play--and I will get to that in a minute--but it is at least as important to look at what he has to say. If, in anything he has to say, the personal seems to conflict to the point of hypocrisy, it is our task to point this out. However, merely giving one star for the pleasure of denigrating Mr. Gingrich adds to the demise and the further politicization of these reviews, to the detriment of future buyers.
Gingrich's thesis is that America is exceptional--which is hardly exceptional--and that people should defend that 'exceptionalism' against the forces of evil, being those of his political opponents. His five themes of exceptionalism surround 'faith and family'; 'work'; 'civil society'; 'rule of law'; and 'safety and peace,' hardly exceptionally American material, right?
Gingrich fails to explain, then, in any detail, why America is exceptional, which is surprising for a book with the eponymous title. For instance, what is exceptional about American faith and family vis-à-vis any other country's faith and family? If he wants to argue that America's founding was Christian unlike any other Western country's, he is patently wrong (with the exception of a revolutionary France, perhaps). If he wants to argue that the United States is the most religious nation in the Western world, he may well be right, but then this would equally mean that it has become exceptional, so to speak, with the secularization of other Western countries. He could argue that America's religion has differed from those in other countries, but he doesn't go there: unlike other countries' religions, America's has so often been the more optimistic, following what has been called a market model, wholly unlike what was found in European countries until recently.
Gingrich is a good storyteller, no doubt about it, who produces one or two books a year these days. Yet, that is, as long as the factual, the truthful, can be put outside of the center. Going through the many historical misdemeanors one would not expect, and one cannot accept from a professional historian, one gets the impression that he doesn't mind tweaking history a little in his direction here and there, leaving out the nastier parts, getting rid of the flotsam and jetsam of unneeded artifacts.
Very literally, Gingrich's history is just that: his story. Despite my sympathy for the Puritans and Pilgrims, only in the most ana of anachronisms can a theocracy be called democratic, as Gingrich does. Only in the most presentist of determinisms can the Mayflower Compact be said to lead up to the Declaration of Independence and up to the present day, as Gingrich does. Only in the most simplistic of representations can the Civil War be said to have been a war "over the nature of equality," as Gingrich does. Even Lincoln did not argue for equality until the Emancipation Proclamation. And only in a credulous kind of sophistry could one come up with a statement like "the American revolutionaries did not shed their blood for the welfare state." It only makes for a vacuous statement: of course the revolutionaries did not know the concept of the welfare state.
We are all guilty of this tendency, to leave out a little truth that we do not have any use of. But when these little truths add up to some big truth, negligence becomes an academic misdemeanor. When Gingrich argues that all the Founding Fathers were particularly Christian, he fails to take into account the many differences between them--who wasn't religious in the late eighteenth century? And yet, is not Jefferson's Deism extremely well documented? How many times does one have to look in
The Jefferson Bible
, to accept the fact that Jefferson wasn't quite the Christian, Gingrich--in his overgeneralization--wants him to be. Furthermore, John Adams argued that "the Government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian religion" (See the Treaty of Tripoli). Now, it goes without saying that you won't find Jefferson in the parts of the book where Gingrich deals with faith and family.
Gingrich cites Jefferson in another section, though: "Neither aiming at originality of principle or sentiment, nor yet copied from any particular and previous writing, it was intended to be an expression of the American mind." Obviously this strengthens Gingrich's argument that America is exceptional, but we may wonder if even Jefferson, in private, thought it true himself, or if he did, whether it is actually true. John Adams came up with a completely different assessment: "The origins of the two Republics [that is the US and the Dutch Republic] are so much alike that the history of one seems but a transcript from that of the other." This is not to say that the Declaration of Independence is not an exceptional document, but I would suggest Gingrich read the Dutch "Act of Abjuration" and see for himself the amount of overlap. Like any clichéd reading of the founding, Gingrich argues that in the case Americans could not come up with a truly indigenous response, they took to the British, e.g., the Scottish Enlightenment.
At certain points, Gingrich contradicts himself to the point of hypocrisy. For instance, Gingrich explains first that the United States is not a democracy in any literal sense of the word, certainly not a direct democracy, to protect liberty and to protect minorities from the tyranny of the majority, which is correct. But just a little later, when discussing the Affordable Care Act, he argues: "[T]he Left passed ObamaCare despite the clear opposition of the American people." Leaving aside the fact whether the Act is good or bad, or even whether it is good to have a law so many people oppose, the fact of the matter is, as Gingrich has shown, the US is an indirect democracy. You can't have the cake and eat it too.
It is interesting to see Gingrich's play with words. Take, for instance, the example of his use of "radicals." Thus, latter-day "radicals," according to Gingrich, "outright oppose American Exceptionalism." Just a little later, it becomes evident that this "radical view," is espoused by the mainstream media. We find "radical secularists," "radical activists," those who want to radically redefine institutions, etc. Then, Roger Williams's amiable concept of freedom of religion is deemed "radical" by Gingrich, and the Pilgrims being "egalitarian" and "democratic" is deemed a "radical departure from the European model." Might not the "radicalism" be an inherent part of any type of exceptionalism? Were it not the highly progressive (yes) ideals of the Founding Fathers that made their documents so worthwhile? It is also intriguing in this regard to look at the many instances in which liberals are portrayed to "think" something is right, while conservatives, in Gingrich's parlance, "understand;" "recognize."
We have to probe and expose such ideas (cf. p.97) as one may read/hear: `the Founders wanted it that way,' or worse, 'the Founders would've wanted it that way.' Where does their authority to demand--granted, this is a non-existent demand--a static America come from? It is good to have respect for the Founding Fathers and their radical ideas, and I have the utmost respect for them: the Declaration of Independence and the US Constitution are truly remarkable documents. But among the many great ideas they held, there were also ones we now deem unseemly (The three-fifths rule is a case in point). Should we continue to adhere to these ideas, or in fact, do we have a right, do we have the freedom, to think for our own circa 250 years later, and establish that some ideas may in fact have been not so good? The fact of the matter is, people change, countries change.
We must deconstruct Gingrich's purported "natural alli[ance]" of economic conservatives and social conservatives. There obviously is none. Actually, whenever someone uses the word natural, please do pay heed, and don't just accept its 'naturalness' at face value. First of all--and this is only a minor problem--what is natural about any alliance? What is more important to think about here is the following: fiscal conservatives, who believe that small government governs best, would hardly be consistent if they wanted an ever-growing, encroaching government in the personal sphere. When Virginia institutes a mandatory trans-vaginal ultrasound procedure prior to all abortions (luckily watered down), this only leads to a bigger government, not smaller, and therefore is inconsistent with fiscal conservatism. On a related note, it never ceases to amaze me how Gingrich is able to dismiss and effectively hail the gross government infringements of the PATRIOT Act (unrestricted wiretappings, undoing of habeas corpus), while being furious over infringements of the mandate kind (which Gingrich, for quite some time, in fact, supported). Is it too much to ask for a little (and) meritable consistency in our politicians?
Ron Paul, a true constitutionalist and deemed (indeed) "radical" by the GOP Establishment, must have felt quite disconcerted--as should we--upon hearing Gingrich exclaim during one of the 2012 primary debates: "First of all, as maximum covert operations-- to block and disrupt the Iranian program-- in-- including-- taking out their scientists, including breaking up their systems. All of it covertly, all of it deniable. Waging covert war, all without any declaration of war." So very constitutional: that's what I call a loose reading of the Constitution. Oh, by the way, President Obama is nothing better in this regard, as can be read in Sanger's
Confront and Conceal: Obama's Secret Wars and Surprising Use of American Power
.
And Gingrich, actually, says it best when he refers to the Declaration of Independence: It "does not catalog acceptable and unacceptable pursuits of happiness and does not instruct people on how to live out their freedoms. This was not the concern of the Founders, who focused on limiting government's power to infringe on individual freedom, especially the right of individuals to live the lives as they see fit, including through association." Exactly, the pursuit of happiness is a live and let live enterprise.
Finally, I must admit, I find it rather hard to read Gingrich's passages on faith and family without any vicarious sort of embarrassment or nervous smile. With due respect, but it is a little odd to have a thrice divorced adulterer talk about the sanctity of marriage. Doesn't this exponentially decrease the value of the words he utters? More importantly, hasn't he himself exponentially decreased the value of marriage itself? This is the same man who after having been married thrice, then pledged to uphold the definition of marriage as being between one man and one woman (indeed, ONE man and ONE woman). Pace, Gingrich, by the way, the definition of marriage has been redefined dozens of times throughout history. Now, with his background information, it may come as a surprise that Gingrich expresses agreement and cites Justice Scalia's dissent in Lawrence v Texas: "This effectively decrees the end of all moral legislation," including "criminal laws against fornication, bigamy, adultery, adult incest, bestiality, and obscenity." What unprecedented braggadocio to use this statement.
What remains is a book that leaves a bad taste in my mouth. Gingrich is an intelligent man. Doesn't he argue that "textbooks should be reviewed to ensure their factual accuracy"?
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