Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich says President Barack
Obama should nominate Colin Powell as secretary of state as a
"bipartisan" gesture toward mending fences with Republican senators who
rejected U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice for the post.
"I actually think it would not be a bad idea for President Obama to
seriously consider seeing if Colin Powell would come back out of
retirement because Colin did endorse him," Gingrich told Fox News' Sean
Hannity Thursday night.
"That might be a bipartisan step that would move us in a direction
of a different kind of dialogue," he said, suggesting that Powell's
moderate views would serve the country better than any other possible
nominees to succeed outgoing Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
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The Georgia Republican and former presidential candidate also
dismissed as an "absurdity" suggestions by some in the administration
that Rice was rejected by GOP Sens. John McCain and Lindsey Graham, as
well as others, because she was black and a woman.
"The Republican Party did nominate Colin Powell, who became
secretary of state. They did nominate Condoleezza Rice, who became
secretary of state," Gingrich pointed out. "It would seem to me that on
those grounds, [it would] be pretty hard to come back and say that the
senators who had problems [with Susan Rice] were doing so for either
racial or sexual reasons.
"They clearly have proven the willingness to work with African-Americans of both male and female," he added.
Gingrich said Republican objections to Rice as a possible nominee
for secretary of state were based on one simple fact — that she did not
tell the truth about terrorist attacks on the U.S. mission in Benghazi,
Libya that took place on Sept. 11 of this year.
"Ambassador Rice misled the entire country in public, and she
couldn't withstand the scrutiny of having lied to the American people,"
he added.
Gingrich said if Rice "has a grievance" with anybody over her clash with Republicans on Benghazi, it should be with the president.
Gingrich said if Rice "has a grievance" with anybody over her clash with Republicans on Benghazi, it should be with the president.
"The fact is . . . she was sent out by the president to say things
that were false. She was used for five shows in one Sunday to tell the
American people something that was not true," he said.
"And I think if she has a complaint with anybody, it ought to be
with President Obama, who sent her out there, using her politically,
even though she was the U.N. ambassador."
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