Gingrich, Newton Leroy

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Newton Leroy Gingrich (born June 17, 1943) is an American politician who is best known as the Speaker of the United States House of Representatives from 1995 to 1999. In 1995 he was named Time Magazine's Man of the Year for his role in leading the Republican Revolution in Congress, ending 40 years of Democratic majorities in the House. During his tenure as Speaker he represented the public face of the Republican opposition to President Bill Clinton.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DYgbxirVAAA1988.jpg:large

A college history professor and prolific author, Gingrich twice ran unsuccessfully for the House before first winning a seat in November 1978. He was re-elected ten times, and his activism as a member of the House's Republican minority eventually enabled him to succeed Dick Cheney as House Minority Whip in 1989. As a co-author of the 1994 Contract With America, Gingrich was in the forefront of the Republican Party's dramatic success in the 1994 Congressional elections, and was subsequently elected Speaker. Gingrich's leadership in Congress was marked by opposition to many of the policies of the Clinton Administration and Gingrich presided over the House during the impeachment of President Clinton.

After resigning his seat under pressure from several sides, Gingrich has maintained a career as a political analyst and consultant, and continues to write works related to government and other subjects such as historical fiction. He has expressed interest in being a candidate for the 2008 Republican nomination for the Presidency.

Gingrich has been married three times. He married his first wife, Jackie Battley, in 1962, and divorced her in 1981. Gingrich married his second wife, Marianne Ginther, in the fall of 1981. They divorced in 1999, after revealing that he had been having an affair with a House aide, Callista Bisek. Gingrich and Bisek were married the following year.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gingrich

1 Real Conservative Values
- 1.1 Personal life
- 1.2 Political Life
2 Language: A Key Mechanism of Control Newt Gingrich's 1996 GOPAC memo
- 2.1 Optimistic Positive Governing Words
- 2.2 Contrasting Words
3 Newt Gingrich, supreme fear-monger
4 How corrupt is Newt Gingrich?
- 4.1 reprimand from the ethics committee
  - 4.1.1 Boehner wins civil suit against McDermott
5 Gingrich's "outsider" act
6 Gingrich writes off Bush, blames Rove for failures, likely will not run in '08
7 Gingrich offers advice on 'real war'
8 Gingrich raises alarm at event honoring those who stand up for freedom of speech
9 Gingrich: An Open Memorandum to House Republicans
10 Gingrich Disciples Could be Tossed Out by Voters
11 Gingrich Urges Overriding Supreme Court
12 Gingrich links

Real Conservative Values

Personal life

Gingrich has been married three times, to three different women.

He first married Jackie Battley, his former high school geometry teacher, when he was 19 years old, and she was 26 years old. They had two daughters. The couple decided to divorce after Gingrich told his wife of his extra-marital affair while she was recovering from cancer surgery.[58] In 1981, six months after his divorce was final, Gingrich wed Marianne Ginther.[59] He remained married to Ginther until 2000, when they divorced.

Shortly after his second divorce, Gingrich married Callista Bisek, who is 23 years his junior. He began his relationship with Bisek while he was still married to his second wife. Ironically, this extramarital affair started during the Congressional investigation of Bill Clinton's perjury relating to his affair with 23-year-old intern, Monica Lewinsky, which led to Clinton's impeachment.

Newt and Callista Gingrich currently live in McLean, Virginia.

A Baptist since graduate school, Gingrich converted to Catholicism, his wife's faith, on March 29, 2009.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newt_Gingrich#Personal_life

Political Life

While speaker of the House Gingrich ignored vital anti-terrorist legislation in favor of pandering to the Religious Right and publishing salacious details of sex behavior in Washington DC.

Republicans lost five seats in the House in the 1998 midterm elections — the worst performance in 64 years for a party that didn't hold the presidency. Polls showed that Gingrich and the Republican Party's attempt to remove President Clinton from office was widely unpopular among Americans. Gingrich suffered much of the blame for the election loss. Facing another rebellion in the Republican caucus, he announced on November 6, 1998 that he would not only quit as Speaker, but would leave the House as well.

Quitting is a true Conservative Value.

Language: A Key Mechanism of Control Newt Gingrich's 1996 GOPAC memo

Newt Gingrich's 1996 GOPAC memo written by Frank Luntz

As you know, one of the key points in the GOPAC tapes is that "language matters." In the video "We are a Majority," Language is listed as a key mechanism of control used by a majority party, along with Agenda, Rules, Attitude and Learning. As the tapes have been used in training sessions across the country and mailed to candidates we have heard a plaintive plea: "I wish I could speak like Newt."

That takes years of practice. But, we believe that you could have a significant impact on your campaign and the way you communicate if we help a little. That is why we have created this list of words and phrases.

This list is prepared so that you might have a directory of words to use in writing literature and mail, in preparing speeches, and in producing electronic media. The words and phrases are powerful. Read them. Memorize as many as possible. And remember that like any tool, these words will not help if they are not used.

While the list could be the size of the latest "College Edition" dictionary, we have attempted to keep it small enough to be readily useful yet large enough to be broadly functional. The list is divided into two sections: Optimistic Positive Governing words and phrases to help describe your vision for the future of your community (your message) and Contrasting words to help you clearly define the policies and record of your opponent and the Democratic party.

Please let us know if you have any other suggestions or additions. We would also like to know how you use the list. Call us at GOPAC or write with your suggestions and comments. We may include them in the next tape mailing so that others can benefit from your knowledge and experience.

Optimistic Positive Governing Words

Use the list below to help define your campaign and your vision of public service. These words can help give extra power to your message. In addition, these words help develop the positive side of the contrast you should create with your opponent, giving your community something to vote for!

active(ly)
activist
building
candid(ly)
care(ing)
challenge
change
children
choice/choose
citizen
commitment
common sense
compete
confident
conflict
control
courage
crusade
debate
dream
duty
eliminate good-time in prison
empower(ment)
fair
family
freedom
hard work
help
humane
incentive
initiative
lead
learn
legacy
liberty
light
listen
mobilize
moral
movement
opportunity
passionate
peace
pioneer
precious
premise
preserve
principle(d)
pristine
pro- (issue): flag, children, environment, reform
prosperity
protect
proud/pride
provide
reform
rights
share
strength
success
tough
truth
unique
vision
we/us/our

Contrasting Words

Often we search hard for words to define our opponents. Sometimes we are hesitant to use contrast. Remember that creating a difference helps you. These are powerful words that can create a clear and easily understood contrast. Apply these to the opponent, their record, proposals and their party.

abuse of power
anti- (issue): flag, family, child, jobs
betray
bizarre
bosses
bureaucracy
cheat
coercion
"compassion" is not enough
collapse(ing)
consequences
corrupt
corruption
criminal rights
crisis
cynicism
decay
deeper
destroy
destructive
devour
disgrace
endanger
excuses
failure (fail)
greed
hypocrisy
ideological
impose
incompetent
insecure
insensitive
intolerant
liberal
lie
limit(s)
machine
mandate(s)
obsolete
pathetic
patronage
permissive attitude
pessimistic
punish (poor ...)
radical
red tape
self-serving
selfish
sensationalists
shallow
shame
sick
spend(ing)
stagnation
status quo
steal
taxes
they/them
threaten
traitors
unionized
urgent (cy)
waste
welfare

Newt Gingrich, supreme fear-monger

Even when set against all the reckless fear-mongering being spewed in response to last week's Supreme Court ruling -- which merely held that our Government can't abolish the constitutional guarantee of habeas corpus and must provide minimum due process to people before locking them in cages for life -- this comment by Newt Gingrich on Face the Nation this weekend is in a class all by itself:

On the other hand, I will say, the recent Supreme Court decision to turn over to a local district judge decisions of national security and life and death that should be made by the president and the Congress is the most extraordinarily arrogant and destructive decision the Supreme Court has made in its history. . . . . Worse than Dred Scott, worse than–because–for this following reason: . . .

This court decision is a disaster which could cost us a city. And the debate ought to be over whether or not you're prepared to risk losing an American city on behalf of five lawyers . . . .

We better not allow people we seek to imprison for life to have access to a court -- or require our Government to show evidence before it encages people for decades -- otherwise . . . we'll "lose a city."

http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2008/06/16/gingrich/

How corrupt is Newt Gingrich?

reprimand from the ethics committee

Boehner wins civil suit against McDermott

By Jackie Kucinich May 01, 2007

Rep. Jim McDermott (D-Wash.) did not have the right to disclose a tape that contained an illegally recorded call between now-Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) and members of Republican leadership in 1996, according to a D.C. United States Court of Appeals ruling released Tuesday.

According to court documents, Boehner, who was then Republican Conference chairman, participated in a conference call of Republican leaders, including then-House Speaker Newt Gingrich (Ga.). The GOP leaders discussed Gingrich’s decision to accept a reprimand from the ethics committee in exchange for the committee’s pledge not to hold a hearing.

The cell phone conversation was picked up by a police scanner and taped by two individuals, John and Alice Martin, who later passed it along to McDermott. The lawmaker, who was the ranking Democrat on the ethics panel at the time, then gave the tape to the media.

“When Representative McDermott became a member of the Ethics Committee, he voluntarily accepted a duty of confidentiality that covered his receipt and handling of the Martins’ illegal recording,” the decision said. “He therefore had no First Amendment right to disclose the tape to the media.” McDermott had argued that he lawfully obtained the tape, allowing him to release it to the media under the First Amendment; however, as a member of the ethics committee he was subject to a set of rules prohibiting him from “disclosing evidence relating to an investigation to any person or organization outside the committee” unless authorized to do so.

Boehner and McDermott did not immediately comment on the decision.

http://thehill.com/leading-the-news/boehner-wins-civil-suit-against-mcdermott-2007-05-01.html

Gingrich's "outsider" act

As he eyes the White House, the former speaker tries to distance himself from the Bush administration, but he helped the president make his biggest mistake.

By Alex Koppelman

December 22, 2006 Newt Gingrich still denies that he has made up his mind about whether or not to seek the presidency -- and if he does, it will only be because America demands it. "I am not 'running' for president," he told Fortune magazine in November. "I am seeking to create a movement to win the future by offering a series of solutions so compelling that if the American people say I have to be president, it will happen."

Gingrich is, however, running away from his former friends. As the former speaker of the House unsubtly positions himself for a shot at the nomination, his latest tactic seems to be distancing himself from the political polonium that is the Bush administration. A recent article in Insight magazine, a publication affiliated with the conservative Washington Times newspaper, describes unnamed sources "close to Gingrich" as saying the former speaker was breaking with the administration: "Newt bit his tongue for months and now feels he has to tell his base the truth: the White House does not have the will or the power to promote any agenda."

In an interview with Salon –- during which he said he will make his decision about a White House bid after Labor Day -- he struck the same maverick pose. "I'm an outsider," he claimed. "I have no interest in propping up whatever the current slogans [are] of whatever establishment you want to describe."

"I cue off of facts, and I cue off of the American people, and I don't particularly cue off the power structure in this city or the patterns of Georgetown cocktail parties."

But when it comes to the "establishment" or "power structure," Gingrich has been anything but an outsider. He may now be trying to put some distance between himself and the Bush administration, but his fingerprints are all over the very debacle that has made the president politically toxic. As a close advisor to the administration over the past six years, as an intimate of both Vice President Dick Cheney and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, Gingrich was an powerful advocate both for the idea of invading Iraq and for the botched way in which it was done.

Gingrich wasn't merely a booster of the war and the manner in which it was conducted, said Kenneth Adelman, who like Gingrich was a member of the influential Defense Policy Board Advisory Committee, which advises the Secretary of Defense. He was involved in the hands-on planning.

"Rumsfeld thought very highly of [Gingrich]," Adelman said. "There were times quite apart from the Defense Policy Board that he was called in to meet with Rumsfeld." Adelman added that the Defense Secretary told him that Gingrich had gone down to the Central Command in Tampa, Fla., where the U.S. military directs its operations in the Middle East and "worked on war plans and proved very valuable." (Asked for confirmation of the visit, Gingrich spokesman Rick Tyler said, "All I can say is that he's made many trips to CentCom ... My guess is that's right.")

Gingrich used to like to talk about his influence at the Bush White House. In the beginning of the current administration, and especially after 9/11, when the president's popularity was at a peak, Gingrich felt no compunction in freely discussing his new role back in the seat of power three years after leaving Congress. In November 2001, the New Yorker reported that Gingrich had been scheduled to meet with Cheney on Sept. 11 to discuss what Gingrich perceived as the president's failure to properly communicate his message. Gingrich told the New Yorker at the time that he had "pretty remarkable access to all the senior leadership," including Karen Hughes, Karl Rove and then-National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice, a former colleague whom Gingrich says he spoke with "routinely" in the run-up to the war in Iraq.

Most important, Gingrich met regularly with one old friend, Cheney, and advised another, Rumsfeld. But his influence was also felt in the former employees who had taken jobs throughout the administration. Notably, Bill Luti and William Bruner, who had served Gingrich as military affairs advisors during his days as speaker, were central figures in the Bush team's politicization of intelligence. They worked for the infamous Office of Special Plans, the Department of Defense's "stovepiping" operation that was responsible for much of the questionable intelligence on Iraq. Bruner himself was the handler for Ahmad Chalabi, the exiled Iraqi who provided much of the OSP's most dubious data. Bruner and Luti worked with Elliott Abrams, the disgraced Iran-Contra figure whose redemption Gingrich had kick-started.

As war approached, Gingrich wasn't just helping the Pentagon to plan the conflict. He often acted as a proxy for Iraq hawks. Media reports place Gingrich at the CIA, where, England's Guardian newspaper reported, he was engaged in pressuring analysts on Iraq intelligence. Gingrich, who says he did go to Langley to discuss other intelligence matters at the request of then-CIA director George Tenet, denies the allegation.

"I never went down to Langley, before the war, on Iraq intelligence. I went down on other topics," he said. "I thought, frankly, the argument for replacing Saddam was so overwhelming that it was silly to base it on weapons of mass destruction. And it never occurred to me that [intelligence on weapons of mass destruction] would be such a total mess."

But as the administration geared up for war, Gingrich was striking a different note. In a paper written late in 2001 for the American Enterprise Institute, where he is a senior fellow, he asserted, "We are a serious nation, and the message should be simple if this is to be a serious war: Saddam will stop his efforts and close down all programs to create weapons of mass destruction." On Oct. 31, 2002, he wrote an opinion piece for the Washington Times opposing proposed U.N. inspections of Iraq's supposed WMD facilities; in it, he said, "President Bush and his administration have been abundantly clear why they believe Saddam must be replaced. They have convincingly argued that time is on the side of the Iraqi dictator, and that every day spent waiting is another day for him to expand his biological, chemical and nuclear weapons of mass destruction program." In a piece for USA Today on Oct. 16, 2002, he wrote, "The question is not, 'Should we replace Saddam?' The question is, 'Should we wait until Saddam gives biological, chemical and nuclear weapons to terrorists?' We should not wait until Saddam has the full capacity to create terror around the planet and is able to blackmail with nuclear weapons. Waiting is not an option."

In fact, Gingrich's seat on the Defense Policy Board put him at the heart of the administration faction that was pushing to wage war on Iraq. During two meetings little more than a week after 9/11, according to the New York Times, board members became convinced that Iraq should be the next target after the invasion of Afghanistan. Gingrich was quoted in that Times report, on Oct. 12, 2001, as saying, "If we don't use this as the moment to replace Saddam after we replace the Taliban, we are setting the stage for disaster."

Beyond advocating for the war, Gingrich was also advocating for the specific way it was fought: the Rumsfeldian strategy calling for a smaller invasion force and "footprint." Gingrich has long been a proponent of this kind of change in the military. In 1981 he, along with Al Gore and others, began the Military Reform Caucus to explore those types of changes. In a speech to the Hoover Institution in the summer of 2002, he praised Rumsfeld's tactical decisions in Afghanistan, saying, "The standard plan in Afghanistan was either Tomahawks or five divisions, and that's why Rumsfeld was so important. 'Cause Rumsfeld sat down and said, "Well, what if we do this other thing? You know, three guys on horseback, a B-2 overhead." And it was a huge shock to the army ... because it worked."

In December 2002, speaking to the Washington Post, he criticized senior military officials for wanting to fight a bigger, more conventional war and praised Gen. Tommy Franks for having a "more integrated, more aggressive and more risk-taking plan." And after the war began, he praised the administration for sticking by its decision to go with a light, fast invasion, telling the Post that there was a "'moment when the old Army was pounding away, saying that we were out there and facing the Republican Guard with too small of a force ... That was the moment of optimum danger. A less confident administration might have paused and waited for another division to come up."

Gingrich also took part in the Bush administration's Iraq-inspired intramural policy battles. He chose the side of the popular kids, the hawks and neocons. At the beginning of the war, in 2003, as a fight brewed between the skeptics at the State Department and the Rumsfeld-Cheney faction, Gingrich struck out at Secretary of State Colin Powell. In a series of speeches, interviews and articles in the spring and early summer of 2003, Gingrich denounced the State Department as "pathetic," a "broken institution" whose "pattern of diplomatic failure is beginning once again and threatens to undo the effects of military victory."

Because of the timing, many observers interpreted this as Gingrich's taking the part of his allies in the administration, noting also that Gingrich, who usually speaks extemporaneously, carried notes for the speeches. Gingrich denies to Salon that there was any coordination; he said he "suspect[s] if they'd known I was going to be that blunt and direct, they might have asked me not to make it, because it was a very tough speech." That statement seems to be contradicted by prior remarks from Tyler, his spokesman. According to an April 30, 2003, article in the Hill newspaper, Tyler said about a dozen people, including members of Gingrich's staff and "unnamed government officials," saw one of the speeches before Gingrich gave it.

After the attacks, says Lawrence Wilkerson, who was chief of staff to Powell, Gingrich sent a letter to Powell offering his help in fixing the problems he saw.

"That's Newt's audacity," Wilkerson said. "That was either intended to be a finger in the eye of the secretary, or it showed that sometimes this man who thinks he's ready to be president just has no grasp as to what his actions mean. Take your pick as to which it is."

When the war in Iraq started to go bad, when the predictions made by doubters like Powell started to come true, Gingrich jumped ship. He was one of the earliest conservative critics of the war, coming out in December 2003 to say that Iraq policy was going off a cliff," and that " we need to ... put the Iraqis at the center of this equation and recognize that most Iraqis do not want to go back to a brutal, murdering, raping dictatorship. Most Iraqis want to have an organized way of governing themselves, but they want to be in charge of their own country."

Did the war go wrong because the powers that be weren't really listening to Newt? Gingrich says today that his advice on how to conduct the war, which was unheeded, "was to go in and get out. I've been pretty clear about that ... I was extremely public and clear about it, so it was not secret advice. I thought it was a major mistake for us to try to be a governing, occupying power. I thought Bremer did exactly the wrong things."

But if they didn't take his advice, it's not because they're weren't getting it. There is documentation that he had access. He maintained regular e-mail communication with Rumsfeld. One way Gingrich used that channel was to advocate against the Stryker, an armed combat vehicle that is the first new military vehicle since the M2 Bradley tank. Wilkerson says Gingrich, a military historian who has a Ph.D. in history and teaches at the National Defense University, sent frequent e-mails, one 12 pages long, to Rumsfeld about his misgivings about the Stryker. Those e-mails, perhaps unbeknownst to Gingrich, were shared throughout the military community.

"You send e-mails to the secretary of defense, I don't care how good you think you are, or how encrypted you think you are, general officers are going to get a hold of them," Wilkerson said. "So here's Newt weighing in with the secretary of defense, via e-mail, to kill the Stryker program, indeed holding his own demonstrations at Andrews Air Force Base to prove the Stryker couldn't be loaded on a C-130, and here's General Shinseki, chief of staff of the Army, who's advocating the Stryker and trying to get it sold within the Army, reading this crap. I mean, this is typical Newt."

Gingrich, for his part, says he lost that fight, that it was a case in which an individual could not win against the institutional power of the Army.

"The institutional momentum of the Army was overwhelmingly committed to making it happen, and they have a good story to tell," he said. He also conceded, while saying that his criticisms of the program remain valid, that "if you go out and ... talk to guys who were in Iraq, they'll tell you it's turned out to be a pretty good system that offers them a level of mobility that's very interesting and has great capabilities."

That Gingrich lost on the Stryker might be emblematic of what Wilkerson and others have described as an essential element of Gingrich's personality and operating tactics –- something that, ironically, gives him plausible deniability when it comes to the Iraq mess. Gingrich is a man of many ideas, not all of them sound, more than a few ignored. A source who, in 2003, leaked to the Washington Post the existence of the Gingrich-Rumsfeld e-mail channel, said Rumsfeld knew there was a "ratchet factor with Newt. You've got to ratchet down what Newt tells you ... You've got to modify [it]."

Wilkerson agrees. "He'll have 10 ideas a day, nine of which will be preposterous, one of which will be good," he said. "Your job, usually, was to find that one good one ... Don't get me wrong -- in some respects, I have a great deal of respect for Newt's ability to do that ... [But] with all these brilliant ideas, there was never any granularity."

"Gingrich is what he is," Wilkerson said. "Disingenuous as hell, never held to accountability for the nine ideas out of ten that don't work ... but I don't think he runs around operating secret cabals in order to effect major changes in policy. He just does it upfront and in your face. Now, I may be wrong, but that's not my appreciation of him. Luti, Feith [Douglas Feith, former under-secretary of defense for policy] and that crew, they're the backroom gang. They're Nazis. They're Gestapo."

But Gingrich's ideas do sometimes translate into policy. Perhaps the best example is the Department of Homeland Security, for years a pet project of Gingrich's -- former Sen. Warren Rudman, whose Hart-Rudman Commission was one of the driving forces behind DHS's creation, once called Gingrich the father of the idea.

"I argued for it very passionately," Gingrich said, but he criticizes what it has become. "The current Department of Homeland Security is a thin, weak façade of the system we will someday need, and Katrina was absolute proof that we are not very far down the road towards having a serious Department of Homeland Security."

But Wilkerson says that, as in his criticism of the State Department, which Wilkerson believes was severely damaged by legislation passed under Gingrich, the former speaker is attacking a problem largely of his own making.

"He will take part in 100 things, 90 of which will ultimately be wrecks, and then there'll be no accountability ... I would contend one of the train wrecks that he's left in his wake is the Homeland Security Department ... I think it's a disaster. I doubt that we'll ever reverse it, because once you've created something that behemoth-like in our federal bureaucracy, oh God help the person who tries to take it down."

Asked whether he worried that his connections to failed projects like DHS and to the war, not to mention an administration many perceive to have failed generally, would damage his political prospects, Gingrich was dismissive.

"No more than the connections I have to looking at health or the connections I have to being on Fox News," he said. "Given the recent Virginia campaign, should I take encouragement at having written, helping coauthor, four novels, which I'm sure could be taken out of context by some consultant? ... I don't worry about it ... I let guys like you do that."

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2006/12/22/newt_gingrich/

Gingrich writes off Bush, blames Rove for failures, likely will not run in '08

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich speaks at the GOP Christmas dinner dance in Manchester, N.H., Friday, Dec. 15, 2006.

December 19, 2006 Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich has decided to break with President Bush.

Sources close to Mr. Gingrich said that, after having kept silent for more than a year, he has become openly critical of the administration, portraying the president as a weak man akin to Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter. The former House speaker has warned conservatives not to expect anything from the White House over the remaining two years and instead focus on building a base for leadership for 2008.

"Newt bit his tongue for months and now feels he has to tell his base the truth: the White House does not have the will or the power to promote any agenda," a source close to Mr. Gingrich said.

The sources said Mr. Gingrich, who refuses to commit to a presidential bid in 2008, blames White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove for Mr. Bush's mistakes, including the loss of Congress in 2006. They said Mr. Gingrich's criticism of the top Bush political adviser has been considered by the president and this could lead to Mr. Rove's early departure.

On Nov. 30, Mr. Gingrich, hosted by dozens of powerful conservatives, spoke at a private fund raiser for the Virginia Conservative Action PAC. Mr. Gingrich, lamenting the waste of the Republican Party's huge ad campaign during the 2006 election, called on Mr. Rove to either change his losing strategy or quit.

"2004 was pathetic, and 2006 was worse," Mr. Gingrich said, referring to the Rove-directed GOP campaigns.

Mr. Gingrich gave several reasons for the GOP’s loss of Congress in 2006. He cited the U.S. failure to stabilize Iraq, the botched relief effort after Hurricane Katrina and the lack of an agenda that could have inspired Americans.

"If there was no FEMA, New Orleans would have recovered faster," Mr. Gingrich said.

Mr. Gingrich called on Mr. Bush to step up the war against terrorism and to crackdown on illegal immigration. Those attending the fund raiser concluded that Mr. Gingrich expected that conservatives will be forced out of the White House over the next few months.

Sources close to Mr. Gingrich said he's likely ruled out a race for 2008. They said Mr. Gingrich expects Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, New York Democrat, to become the next president and intends to position himself as the Republican presidential nominee for 2012.

"He is getting conservative money," the source said. "He has aspirations and heavy support. His mistakes as House speaker have been forgiven. He is being received tremendously from grassroots [activists]. But this won't be enough for any Republican in 2008."

http://www.insightmag.com/Media/MediaManager/Gingrich3.htm

Gingrich offers advice on 'real war'

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich.

December 15, 2006 Newt Gingrich — a possible Republican presidential candidate in 2008 — offered advice on the Iraq war to President Bush as he addressed a New Century Forum luncheon Wednesday at the Commerce Club in Atlanta.

"Sometime very early next year, the president ought to give an address about the real war, which is the total threat to American security, of which Iraq and Afghanistan are just pieces," said Gingrich, a former House speaker and Georgia congressman. "My biggest disappointment in the Baker-Hamilton Commission was that they talked about Iraq in isolation. ... We have an emerging worldwide threat that's a combination of dictatorships, religious fanatics and extremists who are willing to use violence that we can't understand and don't know how to talk about."

Gingrich said Americans will understand the peril when "we lose a city," and that he wants the administration to instruct the Department of Homeland Security to conduct three major exercises a year in different cities "to recognize from Katrina that we are totally unprepared for serious attack.

"People would realize, if this goes bad, this is what it's going to be like," he said. "You won't hear anybody else saying, 'Why don't we find a nice face-saving way to get defeated?' "

He said that while he does not support the way the war has been fought, "the answer is to solve the mess and win, because if we leave now we are going to face an Iran that will be terrifying. This is a really hard problem. It's doable and solvable. But it takes real change."

http://www.ajc.com/news/content/news/stories/2006/12/13/1214natgingrich.html

Gingrich raises alarm at event honoring those who stand up for freedom of speech

Tuesday, Nov. 28, 2006 MANCHESTER – Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich yesterday said the country will be forced to reexamine freedom of speech to meet the threat of terrorism.

GINGRICH

Gingrich, speaking at a Manchester awards banquet, said a "different set of rules" may be needed to reduce terrorists' ability to use the Internet and free speech to recruit and get out their message.

"We need to get ahead of the curve before we actually lose a city, which I think could happen in the next decade," said Gingrich, a Republican who helped engineer the GOP's takeover of Congress in 1994.

Gingrich spoke to about 400 state and local power brokers last night at the annual Nackey S. Loeb First Amendment award dinner, which fetes people and organizations that stand up for freedom of speech.

Gingrich sharply criticized campaign finance laws he charged were reducing free speech and doing little to fight attack advertising. He also said court rulings over separation of church and state have hurt citizens' ability to express themselves and their faith.

Last night's event, held at the Radisson Hotel-Center of New Hampshire, honored a Lakes Region newspaper and a former speaker of the House for work in favor of free expression.

The Citizen of Laconia was given the Nackey S. Loeb First Amendment Award, which is named after the longtime President and Publisher of the Union Leader Corporation, owner of New Hampshire's statewide newspaper.

The Citizen scrutinized the Newfound Area School Board beginning last year over a series of e-mail discussions held before public meetings. It also used the right-to-know law to uncover costly decisions by the town of Tilton this year.

Executive Editor John Howe said the decision to pursue the stories led to at least one advertiser canceling its business with the paper.

"We try to practice what we preach, even if it costs us business," Howe said. "And it has and it will in the future.

Also honored was Marshall Cobleigh, former House speaker and a longtime aide to former Gov. Meldrim Thomson.

Cobleigh introduced an amendment to the state Constitution defending free speech. He also helped shepherd the state's 1967 right-to-know law through the Legislature.

Gingrich's speech focused on the First Amendment, but in an interview beforehand, he also hit upon wide-ranging topics.

Gingrich said America has "failed" in Iraq over the past three years and urged a new approach to winning the conflict. The U.S. needs to engage Syria and Iran and increase investment to train the Iraqi army and a national police force, he said. "How does a defeat for America make us safer?" Gingrich said. "I would look at an entirely new strategy." He added: "We have clearly failed in the last three years to achieve the kind of outcome we want."
Political parties in Presidential primary states should host events that invite candidates from both parties to discuss issues, said Gingrich, who criticized the sharpness of today's politics.
Gingrich said voters unhappy with the war, the response to Hurricane Katrina and pork barrel spending were the main drive behind the GOP's rejection at the polls. But he argued Republicans would have retained the Senate and just narrowly lost the House if President Bush had announced the departure of embattled Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld before, instead of after, the election.
Gingrich said he will not decide whether he is running for President until September 2007.

The event last night was sponsored by the Nackey S. Loeb School of Communications. The school was founded in 1999 to promote journalism and other forms of communication.

http://www.unionleader.com/article.aspx?headline=Gingrich+raises+alarm+at+event+honoring+those+who+stand+up+for+freedom+of+speech&articleId=d3f4ee4e-1e90-475a-b1b0-bbcd5baedd78

Gingrich: An Open Memorandum to House Republicans

What Mr. Newt Gingrich fails to mention is that Republicans of his ilk are fundamentally corrupt liars. Their sole purpose is to concentrate wealth and bankrupt the United States of America. Mr. Gingrich is what Vladimir Lenin referred to as useful idiots'; thoughtless people who unintentionally, thought their stupidity, serve the purpose of the enemy rather than our country.

Date: November 15, 2006
To: House Republicans
From: Newt Gingrich

RE: Reflections on being back in the minority and how to become a governing majority.

As we think about the 2006 election and where House Republicans go from here, I want to suggest a few principles and actions that might be helpful.

When I was first elected in 1978, House Republicans had been in the minority for 24 years. Despite our best efforts to win enough seats to gain the majority, it took us 16 more years. If we do not want to return to a possible 40 years in the minority, it is essential that we spend time now thinking about the lessons of 2006 and what has to be done. If we do this, we can accept 2006 as a corrective but necessary interruption in our pursuit of a governing majoritarian party.

In 1946 and 1952, the Democrats found themselves in the minority. On both occasions it only lasted two years. They found the methods to recover, even though in the second case they were operating under a very popular Republican President Eisenhower.

When the Republicans lost their brief majority status in 1954, they could not recover it two years later, despite the fact that Eisenhower was winning a massive re-election. Similarly, they could not regain the majority even in the landslides of 1972 and 1984.

There are some key questions and key principles to keep in mind as we work through the process of earning back the majority.

Republicans lost the 2006 election. Do not hide from this. Do not shrug it off. Our team lost. Why did we lose? What do we have to do differently?

Are House Republicans electing a leadership team to be an effective minority or a leadership team to regain the majority? These are very different roles and require very different considerations, very different strategies and very different leaders.

To regain majority status, we have to focus on the country first and on Washington and the Congress second. If we are responsive to the country, they will support us and return us to power. If we are focused on action in Washington (whether White House action, legislative action or lobbyist and PAC action), we are probably entering a long period in minority status.

Are House Republicans electing leaders to represent House Republican values and strategies to the White House or leaders to represent the White House to House Republicans? Over the next two years, House Republicans and the White House will have very different institutional interests and very different time horizons. If we want to regain majority status, we have to focus on the building of a grassroots coalition which supports real change in Washington.

From a House Republican standpoint, the center of gravity should be the 54 Blue Dog Democrats. If we and the Blue Dogs can find a handful of key things to work on together, we can almost certainly create a majority on the floor just as the Reagan Republicans and conservative Democrats did in 1981. Bipartisanship can be conservative and back bench rather than liberal and establishment leadership defined. What did the Blue Dogs promise to get elected? What was the nature of their coalition back home? They give us the best opportunity to create grassroots efforts to pass solid legislation. Remember, the liberals will find it very hard to write a budget acceptable to the grassroots that elected the Blue Dogs. We have real opportunities if we are creative.

House Republicans should establish new principles for appointing people to the Appropriations Committee. Nothing infuriated the Republican base more than the continued process of earmarks, set asides and incumbent-protection pork. There is no reason for the House Republican conference to reappoint a single appropriator unless they agree to be part of the Republican team. First establish the principles of representing Republican values on appropriations and then ask each appropriator to commit themselves to living by those principles or accept appointment to another committee. There is a legitimate role for set asides in the legislative-executive branch process, but there is no reason to give the executive branch a blank check. There has to be some limits, and those limits should be set by the Conference and not by the committee members.

All of this will take time. As rapidly as possible there should be a three-day member-only retreat to discuss issues like this and to set strategies for the next two years. These kinds of decisions should be a key part of thinking through who should lead House Republicans for the next Congress and how they should lead. One Last Note

Do not underestimate Speaker-elect Nancy Pelosi and her team. She and Rahm Emmanuel finally put together a disciplined recruiting system that allowed a lot of Democrats to run as conservatives, even while they were planning to elect the most liberal Speaker in history. Pelosi is a tough, smart, disciplined professional. She is not going to be easy to beat, and she and her team are going to work hard to keep you in the minority for a decade or more.

This is going to be hard work and will require a lot of dedication and a lot of thought.

With best wishes for a return to majority status as quickly as possible.

Your friend,

Newt Gingrich

Gingrich Disciples Could be Tossed Out by Voters

November 6, 2006 By LIZ SIDOTI - A half-dozen Republican congressmen ushered into office in the 1994 GOP tidal wave that tossed Democrats from power may be swept out on Tuesday, casualties of a Democratic surge fueled by voter anger over the Iraq war.

On the eve of the midterm elections, Republicans are hoping their acclaimed get-out-the-vote operation will ensure majority control. But some say privately they have a slim chance of retaining the House after a grueling campaign centered on turmoil in Iraq, President Bush's sagging approval numbers, political scandals and corruption investigations.

'It all gets down to Republicans turning out the vote,' said Rep. Tom Reynolds, R-N.Y., chairman of the House GOP's election effort.

Sidelined for 12 years, Democrats appear poised to win the House in a shift that likely would elevate Democratic Rep. Nancy Pelosi of California to speaker, the nation's first woman to hold that office, and herald in at least two years of Democratic rule.

'We are playing offense across this country, in every region of this country,' boasts Rep. Rahm Emanuel of Illinois, the head of the House Democrats' campaign committee. 'I'd rather be us than them.'

At least 50 Republican seats are endangered, many with incumbents facing fierce challenges from Democrats who have sought to capitalize on the public's intense disenchantment with one-party rule.

Among those GOP lawmakers in hard-fought races are several vying for seventh terms, first elected in the Republican revolution of 1994.

Back then, the party gained 52 seats to end four decades of Democratic control with promises of balancing the budget and enacting term limits. Hankering for a change in the status quo, voters that year elected Newt Gingrich's hard-charging followers who proposed the vaunted Contract with America.

'The Republicans came to power in 1994 to change Washington, and Washington changed them,' Emanuel said Sunday, while he and Reynolds sparred on NBC's 'Meet the Press.'

As Reynolds shook his head in dissent, Emanuel criticized Republicans for adding to the national debt, scandals involving the GOP rank-and-file and losing their way on fiscal and moral issues.

Gingrich's disciples in the most competitive races this year include:

John Hostettler in Indiana, a leading voice for social conservatives who was among six House Republicans to vote against authorizing force in Iraq in 2002. He is all but certain to lose to Democrat Brad Ellsworth, a county sheriff, in the district dubbed the 'bloody eighth' for it's razor-thin election victories.

Steve Chabot in Ohio, a lawyer from Cincinnati who is considered somewhat of a maverick in the party despite his conservative voting record. He faces a spirited challenge from John Cranley, a Cincinnati city councilman who failed to unseat Chabot in a challenge six years ago.

Barbara Cubin in Wyoming, a fifth-generation resident of the state and a conservative who champions its mining and agriculture industries. Wyoming hasn't elected a Democrat to Congress since 1976, and Cubin's race against Democrat Gary Trauner, a businessman, only recently became competitive.

Gil Gutknecht in Minnesota, who has an occasional independent streak. In the late 1990s, he concluded that Gingrich as speaker had been 'a disappointment to everybody' and that the GOP revolution had been exaggerated. Democrat Tim Walz, a high school teacher, is challenging him.

Charles Bass in New Hampshire, a moderate who has focused on the environment and opposed the Bush administration's proposal to drill for oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. He is in a rematch with Democrat Paul Hodes, a lawyer who ran against Bass in 2004.

J.D. Hayworth in Arizona, a fierce critic of illegal immigration who advocates strong U.S. borders. He opposed the president's proposal for an expanded guest-worker program until border controls are improved. Former state Sen. Harry Mitchell, a Democrat, is trying to unseat him.

Two other members of the rebellious Republican class of 1994 had planned to run for re-election but they recently resigned from Congress when they became ensnared in separate scandals.

Bob Ney of Ohio pleaded guilty in the influence-peddling investigation surrounding disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff, while Mark Foley of Florida admitted having sent sexually explicit electronic communications to underage males who worked as House pages. Democrats are poised to win both of their seats.

In the minority, Democrats need to gain 15 seats to seize control of the House.

On the defensive, Republicans have spent months trying to beat back well-funded Democratic opponents in districts stretching from New Hampshire to California. In the campaign's homestretch, Democrats have widened the battlefield by going after Republicans in states that historically have been solid GOP territory, including Idaho and Kansas.

Clusters of GOP-held seats in the Midwest and the Northeast alone could give Democrats the pickups they need to rise to power.

Five Republican incumbents in Pennsylvania and three in Connecticut - more moderate areas of the country - could end up fired. And, in the traditionally conservative Ohio River Valley, four GOP congressman in Ohio and three in Indiana are fighting for their political lives.

The 2006 election has been likened to 1994, when backlash against the controlling party - then the Democrats - triggered a change in power and ushered in an era of new rulers.

Now, the tables appear poised to turn - with Democrats returning the favor to the Contract-With-America crew that booted them out of office.

http://www.californiachronicle.com/articles/viewArticle.asp?articleID=16075

Gingrich Urges Overriding Supreme Court

Aging Neo-con still hates US Constitution

September 29,2006 WASHINGTON -- Supreme Court decisions that are "so clearly at variance with the national will" should be overridden by the other branches of government, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich says.

"What I reject, out of hand, is the idea that by five to four, judges can rewrite the Constitution, but it takes two-thirds of the House, two-thirds of the Senate and three-fourths of the states to equal five judges," Gingrich said during a Georgetown University Law Center conference on the judiciary.

It takes approval by two-thirds of Congress and three-fourths of the 50 states to adopt an amendment to the Constitution, the government's bedrock document.

Gingrich, a Republican who represented a district in Georgia, noted that overwhelming majorities in Congress had reaffirmed the Pledge of Allegiance, and most of the public believes in its right to recite it.

As such, he said, "It would be a violation of the social compact of this country for the Supreme Court to decide otherwise and would lead, I hope, the two other branches to correct the court."

In 2002, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in California ruled that the pledge was unconstitutional when recited in public schools because of the reference to God. The Supreme Court in 2004 reversed that decision on a technicality, but the case has been revived.

Gingrich said "the other two branches have an absolute obligation to render independent judgment" in cases that are "at variance with the national will."

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1154AP_Gingrich_Scotus.html

http://www.law.georgetown.edu/judiciary/program.html

Gingrich links

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