Republican Governor Jindal: Something Is Wrong With The GOP

Duuuuh! Jindal appearing on Face The Nation (read the complete transcript):

JINDAL: Bob, well, thank you for having me this morning. Clearly, first of all, we need to congratulate President-elect Obama. I think Senator McCain was very gracious on election night. As Republicans, we need to do three things to get back on track. Number one, we have got to stop defending the kind of spending and out-of- control spending that we would never tolerate in the other side. You know, when voters tell us that they trust Democrats more to cut their taxes, control spending, that tells you something is wrong with the Republican Party. We’ve got to match our actions with our rhetoric.

Number two, we’ve got to stop defending the kinds of corruption we would rightfully criticize in the other party. The week before the election, our most senior senator is convicted on federal charges. And that’s only the latest example.

Number three, we have got to be the party that offers real solutions to the problems that American voters, American families are worried about. We don’t need to abandon our conservative principles. We can’t just be the party of no. We need to offer real solutions on making health care more affordable, on the economic challenges facing families, on the international threats.

I think we’re going to have a debate in this country. I’m opposed to a single-payer, government-run health care system. But that’s not enough. We need to also show the American people that we’re for tax credits, we’re for using technology to emphasize preventative primary care, electronic patient records, so every American has access to affordable private coverage.

Jindal gets it. But I don't think Gingrich does:

GINGRICH: No, you know what the number one issue was this fall?

The number one issue this fall was that the Bush administration had failed, OK, and that the Republicans in the House and Senate had failed.

GINGRICH: This was a performance election. You are a 20-, 25-, 30-year-old person and you look at this mess and you say, gosh, do I like this attractive, new, articulate candidate named Obama who is for change we can depend on, or do I want to vote for the party that’s just been failing?

Now, I think we have temporarily a big problem. I think if President-elect Obama is brilliant and committed and lucky, he might well consolidate that vote.

On the other hand, if they watch what you just said in the first half of this show and you end up with Congress bailing out billions to failing companies, and those 20-year-olds and 30-year-olds start to figure out they’re going to pay the taxes, they’re not getting the billions, I think you might find a lot of dissatisfaction by next summer.

Then again, what's wrong with the Democrats. They can't even deal with one of their own who tried to destroy the Democratic nominee, Barack Obama, during the just finished election. This from 'FOX News Sunday'(read the complete transcript):

Senator Dorgan, you have to deal — you and the Senate Democrats have to deal on Tuesday at your House — rather, Senate Democratic Caucus about what to do about Joe Lieberman and whether or not you are going to strip him of his chairmanship of the Homeland Security Committee.

Back in September, you said that Democrats were, quote, "profoundly disappointed" with what he had done and his strong support for McCain over Obama in the election, the fact that he made a tough speech at the Republican convention.

Are you going to vote to strip him of his chairmanship?

DORGAN: Well, I'm not going to discuss — and the — our caucus won't discuss that on television programs. What I think will happen on Tuesday is Senator Lieberman will, I think, make a presentation to the caucus, and the caucus will by secret ballot decide what we might want to do.

And you know, look. Joe is a friend of mine. Joe sits next to me in the Senate. He sits at the desk to my right. He's a good American.

John Podesta on 'FOX News Sunday': Transcript (11-9-08)

The head of Obama's transition team, John Podesta, was interviewed by Chris Wallace. Read the full transcript.

WALLACE: President-elect Obama made it clear in his Friday news conference that job one is the economy, but he left it unclear how active, how involved, he's going to get before his inauguration.

Will he give congressional Democrats clear direction about what he wants them to do in a lame duck session on economic stimulus?

Will he actively engage with the Bush administration on the financial bail-out, or is he going to wait until he takes the oath of office?

PODESTA: Well, we have one president at a time, as President- elect Obama said on Friday, so it's up to — the job is up to President Bush to move that legislation forward and try to keep economic recovery moving today.

But I think what the president-elect wanted to do — he sent a strong signal that we need an economic recovery program moving forward. He'd like to see the stimulus that's pending on Capitol Hill pass.

He wants to see unemployment insurance extended, aid to the states that are struggling with medical insurance — and try to fix their problems and their own budgets so they don't need to lay people off, and try to get job growth going again.

He hopes that will happen during this lame duck session, that the — that President Bush will cooperate. If it doesn't, it would be the first item of business when he comes back.

WALLACE: But for instance, on the financial rescue plan, there are some decisions that are going to be made over the course of the next two months on things — various financial institutions, how to spend that $700 billion, even talk about appointing a permanent head of the — to deal with the rescue.

If the Bush administration asked President Obama — President- elect Obama, "What do you think of this? Will you sign off on this person," is he going to say, "Yes," or, "I'll wait?"

PODESTA: Well, I think that he's going to put his own people in place when he comes to office, and we're moving very aggressively to select both people at the top for cabinet secretary, treasury secretary in particular, but we're also looking at people below the level of cabinet secretary — the undersecretary for domestic finance, the head of the TARP, the so-called TARP, et cetera.

So he's going to put his own team in place. In the meantime, he's designated Dan Tarullo as one of his senior economic advisors to — to have discussions, to be fully informed, fully briefed, with what's going on right now.

Mr. Tarullo has reached out to Secretary Paulson. They've already spoken. They're meeting tomorrow. And we'll have other people who are available to be at the Treasury to understand the decisions that are being made.

But we have one administration at a time. And those are decisions that the Bush administration needs to make while they're in office.

WALLACE: Does the president-elect feel some pressure to name his treasury secretary and his economic team first and quickly to reassure the financial markets?

PODESTA: Well, I think across the board, whether it's national security, the economy, the senior leadership that will manage health care, energy and the environment, I think he intends to move very quickly.

And you know, he's beaten a lot of records during the course of the campaign. I think people probably don't know this, but with the exception of President Bush 41, which was an intraparty transition, no new president has named a cabinet secretary before December, going back through the Kennedy administration.

And I think we're moving aggressively to try to build out that core economic team, the national security team, and you'll see announcements when they're ready.

But again, I'll reference back to what he said on Friday. He said he wants to move with all deliberate haste, but he put the emphasis on deliberate. So he's deliberating what — the strongest team that he could put in place to manage the very, very difficult problems the country is facing, and there will be announcements forthcoming.