Paging CNN...

One politician who's been getting some airtime as a critic of Nancy Pelosi's trip to Syria is former House Speaker Newt Gingrich. A few days ago he hammered Pelosi for going abroad in defiance of the White House's wishes, saying that such defiance of the White House by Congressional leaders was "very dangerous."

But as Speaker himself in May of 1998, Gingrich aggressively inserted himself into American foreign policymaking abroad when he took a high-powered Congressional delegation to Israel. He openly denounced the White House's Middle East policies and made public comments in direct defiance of the White House. Right before his trip he even described then-Secretary of State Madeleine Albright as an "agent for the Palestinians."

In other words, despite the fact that the White House opposed her trip to Syria, Pelosi -- who claims she delivered the White House's message, unlike Gingrich -- has in many ways been more respectful of the White House than Gingrich was on his trip abroad. Yet CNN somehow can still ask without any irony whether Pelosi is on her way to becoming the "most controversial House Speaker yet."

More after the jump.

From ABC News, May 27, 1998:

DAVID ENSOR, ABC News: (voice-over) It's beginning to look as if the days when American partisan politics ended at the water's edge may be over. Rep. NEWT GINGRICH (R), Speaker of the House:... Jerusalem, as the united and eternal capital of Israel. DAVID ENSOR: (voice-over) That runs directly contrary to official US policy, which holds that Jerusalem's future is a matter for negotiation between Palestinians and Israelis. Next, Speaker Gingrich took on the Clinton administration's effort to convince Israel to give up about 13 percent more of the West Bank. He said, quote, "We cannot allow non- Israelis to substitute their judgment for the generals that Israel has trusted with its security." The non-Israelis in question are Secretary of State Madeleine Albright and her aides, one of whom reacted sharply. JAMES RUBIN, State Department Spokesman: Rather stunning comments that would undermine the efforts we're trying to make to advance America's national interest. DAVID ENSOR: (voice-over) But it was a comment made two weeks ago that has Albright's team simmering with anger. "I think it's wrong," Gingrich said then, "for the American secretary of state to become the agent for the Palestinians." JAMES RUBIN: I found particularly appalling an outrageous his suggestion that the secretary of state of the United States was an agent for the Palestinians.

But here's how Gingrich slammed Pelosi's trip to Syria a few days ago:

I don't understand why, as Speaker of the House, she would be going to see a dictator in Damascus when the White House has publicly asked her not to go there. I think it's very dangerous for America to start having 535 secretaries of state and 535 secretaries of defense, all of whom happen to be elected to the U.S. Congress, none of whom were appointed to those jobs.

Why is anyone in the media quoting Gingrich on this? If anyone has less than zero credibility on it, it's he.

Yet here he is getting quoted on MSNBC bashing Pelosi's trip, with no mention whatsoever that Gingrich in many ways did things that were far worse, and CNN is already comparing Pelosi negatively to Newt. Thoroughly bogus.

Update: Don't miss Glenn Greenwald's very good rhetorical questions for Matt Lauer and other journalists covering this. Sample:

Do you think Matt Lauer -- pompously condeming Pelosi's trip -- has the slightest inkling about any of this? Did he do a single thing to read about the history of House Speakers making foreign trips, whether what Pelosi did was at all unusual, whether those condemning her are doing so because they are expressing a principled belief or whether they said the exact opposite when the partisan positions were reversed?