Boehner memoir: Conspiracies and paranoia plagued the ‘Loonyville’ of conservatives

Former U.S. House Speaker John Boehner is not known to pull political punches, and he doesn’t in his new book to be released next week, according to an excerpt published on Politico.com.

Boehner served in Congress, representing the 8th Congressional District from January 1991 to October 2015. St. Martin’s Press will release his forthcoming memoir, On The House, on Tuesday, April 13, where he will share stories of legislative wins and losses, interactions with former presidents, and lessons learned in politics and life.

He also shares thoughts on how conservative personalities, like Sean Hannity and the late Rush Limbaugh, were “dragged” to “Loonyville” by conservative personality Mark Levin. He also said the late Roger Ailes, former Fox News chairman and CEO, “got swept into the conspiracies and the paranoia and became an almost unrecognizable figure.”

“My longtime friend Roger Ailes, the head of Fox News, was not immune to this,” according to Boehner in the Politico excerpt.

“At some point after the 2008 election, something changed with my friend Roger Ailes,” according to Boehner in Politico. “I once met him in New York during the Obama years to plead with him to put a leash on some of the crazies he was putting on the air. It was making my job trying to accomplish anything conservative that much harder. I didn’t expect this meeting to change anything ... .”

Boehner announced his resignation in September 2015, the day after Pope Francis spoke to a joint session of Congress. Boehner often tells people he started his political career when a neighbor got him involved with his homeowners’ association.

He served as a trustee for then-Union Twp. (now known as West Chester Twp.) from 1982 to 1984. He was elected to the Ohio legislature in 1984 and served three terms. He was elected to the U.S. House in November 1990. He was House Minority Leader in 2007 and became Speaker in 2011.

Boehner said he’s “never really been interested” in writing a “typical political memoir.”

“And this won’t be that kind of book,” he said. “This is going to be a book people might want to actually read, no matter where they’re coming from politically, or where they’re coming from in life.”

Boehner now serves as Senior Strategic Advisor for Squire Patton Boggs LLP, a law and public policy firm with several offices around the country, including Cincinnati, Columbus, Cleveland, and Washington, D.C.

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