Newt Gingrich

Gingrich: Austerity Is Wrong For America, We Need Pro-Growth Policies Instead

Sahil Kapur | February 5, 2012, 11:56AM

Newt Gingrich said Sunday that an "age of austerity" is the wrong solution for the economy and would "punish" the American people. He said he prefers "pro-growth" policies instead. The comments appear to pour cold water on the modern Republican belief that austerity and growth go hand in hand.

The 2012 Republican presidential candidate was asked by NBC's David Gregory on "Meet The Press" whether his hopes for a U.S. colony on the moon fly in the face of the GOP's fiscal responsibility mantra. Gingrich responded with some choice words about austerity itself before defending his lunar ambitions.

"First of all, David, I don't think you'll ever find me talking about an age of austerity. I don't think that's the right solution," Gingrich said. "I am a pro-growth Republican. I'm a pro-growth conservative. I think the answer is to grow the economy, not to punish the American people with austerity."

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Newt Gingrich

Newt Gingrich, Space Keynesian

Sahil Kapur | January 26, 2012, 11:10AM

Newt Gingrich's case for boosting federal investments into private sector space projects awkwardly embraces a core tenet of modern liberalism: the belief that government spending can help the economy.

"By the end of my second term, we will have the first permanent base on the moon and it will be American," Gingrich said in Florida, explaining that it would entail "commercial near-Earth activities that include science, tourism and manufacturing, because it is in our interest."

The former Speaker's argument rests on textbook Keynesian economics: the notion that targeted government investments in industries can stimulate economic growth.

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South Carolina primary

Texan GOPer Tells House Not To Freak Out Over Newt Nomination

Sahil Kapur | January 21, 2012, 10:37PM

Rep. Michael Burgess (R-TX)

Soon after Newt Gingrich's victory in the South Carolina primary, Rep. Michael Burgess, a senior House Republican from Texas, told TPM that it's "nonsense" to suggest that the former speaker's potential nomination would damage the GOP's odds in the presidential or congressional races come November.

"I actually think that's nonsense," Burgess told TPM by phone Saturday night. "I think that if we have a good strong national leader as our nominee I think that will reflect well on the races across the country. The people who are concerned about that really ought to do the right thing in their races, and their races will take care of themselves."

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Barack Obama

More Backlash For Wyden Than For Ryan On Controversial Medicare Plan

Brian Beutler | December 15, 2011, 3:35PM

Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) and Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI)

Sen. Ron Wyden wants to assure his colleagues he hasn't undermined them politically. In a head-turning move, Wyden announced Wednesday that he's teamed up with House GOP budget chair Paul Ryan on a policy framework to partially privatize Medicare -- a move that stunned his fellow Democrats.

Setting aside the policy -- which would in essence turn Medicare into ObamaCare with a robust public option -- the very existence of the plan has deep implications for the 2012 elections, most of them bad for his own party.

Speaking to reporters Thursday after an event with Ryan, Wyden said the political ramifications are overblown.

"Nobody ducks their past votes and their previous statements," Wyden said. "That's just a given."

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Medicare

The Bipartisan Political Alliance That Will Turn The Fight Over Medicare On Its Head

Brian Beutler and Benjy Sarlin | December 14, 2011, 9:08PM

Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR), and Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI)

An unholy, unexpected political marriage between a Democratic senator and a House Republican firebrand will have implications beyond Capitol Hill -- and could conceivably alter both the political tenor of the 2012 elections and the long-term policy fight over the future of Medicare.

Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) is teaming up with Paul Ryan, the House's top budget guy and the author of the GOP's controversial budget which proposes phasing out traditional Medicare and replacing it with a private plan. The two announced via The Washington Post that they'll be teaming up on a different version of that Medicare plan -- one that closely mimics plans offered by leading GOP presidential candidates Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney, and a proposal authored by former Sen. Pete Domenici and former Clinton budget director Alice Rivlin, which loomed large in the Super Committee's failed negotiations.

The move makes Wyden the first elected Democrat to endorse creating a premium-support system to compete with traditional fee-for-service Medicare, and for Ryan represents a de facto admission that his own plan was too radical to ever gain bipartisan support. That's bound to affect how congressional and presidential candidates approach the issue, which will feature prominently in next year's elections. But it raises a number of other questions, both about the merits of the policy and of the political calculus behind it.

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Newt Gingrich

CHART OF THE DAY: Gingrich Tax Plan Would Codify Lower Taxes On Rich Than On Middle Class

Brian Beutler | December 13, 2011, 5:04AM

Newt Gingrich addresses a tea party rally in Staten Island, NY on December 3, 2011.

On Monday, the Tax Policy Center published an analysis of Newt Gingrich's plan to overhaul the tax code -- the latest in a series of of analyses of GOP presidential candidate tax proposals. And like all the plans that came before it, Gingrich's constitutes a massive tax cut for the rich. Indeed, no matter how you stack the numbers, Gingrich wants a tax system that permanently holds tax rates on the highest earners lower than tax rates on the middle class.

There are a lot of ways to parse the data. Gingrich proposes creating an alternative tax system that would significantly flatten the code, while keeping the current one in place as an option. So you can run the numbers assuming everybody jumps into the new system, or you can run them assuming that the only people who hop into the new system are people who would benefit financially as a result. And you can compare Gingrich's plan to current tax policy -- including the Bush tax cuts and other temporary tax policy -- or you can compare it to current law, which assumes all of these policies will expire in the next year, and go up on just about everyone.

To be as fair as possible, let's take Gingrich at his word that he would extend the Bush tax cuts for those staying in the current system, and that the only people who would opt into the new system are those who would pay lower taxes as a result.

Here's what happens to people's average federal tax burden as a result.

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Economy

Economic Experts Gather In DC To Explain Why Politics Has Doomed Us

Brian Beutler | December 9, 2011, 6:00AM

Image by Mike Flippo / Shutterstock

As the U.S. government and governments in Europe respond to the global economic slump with conservative austerity measures, it's easy to forget that the overwhelming professional economic consensus is that depressed countries that can afford to should be doing the opposite -- ramping up government purchases of goods and services and putting off the budget cuts and tax increases for a few years.

This isn't even close to what's happening. And as the space between what these experts think should happen and what global elites are actually doing grows, the experts' forecast is becoming more and more pessimistic.

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Stephen Colbert

Colbert: Newt Gingrich Thinks I'm 'Brilliant'

David Taintor | December 6, 2011, 10:30AM

Stephen Colbert

Stephen Colbert was exhausted Monday. He was in Washington over the weekend, celebrating this year's Kennedy Center honorees: Broadway legend Barbara Cook, musician Neil Diamond, musician Sonny Rollins, actress Meryl Streep and cellist Yo-Yo Ma.

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Nancy Pelosi

Democrats Gleeful At Prospect Of Running Against Gingrich

Brian Beutler | December 5, 2011, 5:05AM

Newt Gingrich

There's no better illustration of how ecstatic Democrats are about Newt Gingrich leading the GOP primary pack than Nancy Pelosi's strategic silence.

Pelosi knows more about Gingrich than perhaps any other major national political figure. She was a senior Democrat when Gingrich was House Speaker, served on the ethics committee that investigated Gingrich for tax cheating and campaign finance violations, and even cut a 2008 ad with him on the importance of addressing global climate change.

But when TPM asked her to talk a bit about his recent ascent and the possibility that he'll be the GOP nominee, she mostly demurred.

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Newt Gingrich

Former Directors Blast Gingrich's Plan To Eliminate Congressional Budget Office

Brian Beutler | November 9, 2011, 6:00AM

Former Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-GA)

Newt Gingrich wants to swing into Washington like a wrecking ball and demolish the key barriers between the GOP and the end of universal health care. But his primary target isn't Obamacare itself. Rather it's a non-partisan agency most people outside the beltway have never heard of -- but that the D.C. establishment would arise and take arms to protect.

"If you are serious about real health reform, you must abolish the Congressional Budget Office because it lies," Gingrich said at a Saturday debate with embattled pizza entrepreneur Herman Cain. "Every hospital will tell you that if you get the family and patient involved, it is better and less expensive. The Congressional Budget Office refuses to see this as a savings. It wants more bureaucracy and less patient involvement."

In a technical sense, Gingrich is correct. The Congressional Budget Office will make it hard for Republicans to completely repeal Obamacare, even if they unify control of government in 2013. CBO is the agency that evaluates for lawmakers the impact their legislation is expected to have on the federal budget. And unfortunately for Republicans, the health care law was devised to score as a deficit reducer, particularly after its first 10 years of existence. By direct corollary, the CBO says repealing the whole thing would increase projected deficits. For political and (more importantly) procedural reasons, that would make a complete repeal almost impossible.

Some Republicans want to change the rules that make CBO's words so powerful. Gingrich, by contrast, wants to get rid of CBO altogether. In response, former CBO heads are leaping to its defense -- including a key conservative economist, influential among Republicans.

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Newt Gingrich

Vindication: New Study Shows Newt Gingrich Did Not Pad His Twitter List

Evan McMorris-Santoro | August 25, 2011, 9:08AM

You might want to sit down before you read this: There's good news today for Newt Gingrich.

The former House Speaker may be nowhere in the presidential polls, deeply in debt, and suffering snickers from observers who just watched him campaign in Hawaii but at least he's got one thing going for him -- he probably didn't artificially pad his Twitter follower list.

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Newt Gingrich

Newt Gingrich To Shore Up Primary Vote In Hawaii

Benjy Sarlin | August 17, 2011, 2:31PM

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-GA) with wife, Callista.

It's a critical month in the Republican primaries, as Rick Perry reshuffles the race, the Ames Straw Poll results set in, and candidates prepare for a brutal stretch of debates in September. So where will Newt Gingrich soon spend a three-day stretch campaigning?

That would be sunny Hawaii, where he's scheduled for a meeting with the Maui GOP on Saturday followed by a visit to an elementary school in Makawao on Sunday to teach about the founding fathers.

Politico wryly notes that while the trip is ostensibly for fundraising, it just happens to coincide with Newt and Callista Gingrich's wedding anniversary.

Newt isn't shipping out from Iowa or New Hampshire, either -- Politico notes that Gingrich will be in California on Friday to screen one of Newt Inc.'s movies.

Newt Gingrich

Gingrich: Republicans Will Have A Hard Time Saying No To Extending Payroll Tax Cut

Brian Beutler | August 16, 2011, 11:41AM

Former Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-GA)

GOP Presidential candidate Newt Gingrich says Republicans are going to have a hard time blocking an extension of the payroll tax holiday.

"I think it's very hard not to keep the payroll tax cut in this economy," Gingrich said in a presentation at the conservative Heritage Foundation. "I don't know what Republicans are going to say but I think it's very hard to say 'no.' We're going to end up in a position where we're gonna raise taxes on the lowest income Americans the day they go to work and make life harder for small businesses."

He's referring to a stimulative, two percent payroll tax holiday President Obama negotiated when he agreed to extend the Bush tax cuts in December. It's set to expire at the end of the year, and it's one of the economic growth proposals President Obama has called on Congress to pass when they return from August recess.

"I do think that it's a serious challenge to not extend it," Gingrich added.

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Israel/Palestine

Gingrich: Cut Off U.N. Funding If They Recognize Palestinian State

Eric Kleefeld | August 11, 2011, 12:10PM

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-GA)

In a new column published on Wednesday at Human Events, Newt Gingrich calls for the United States to respond strongly to the expected move by the Palestinians to seek statehood at the United Nations in September -- by threatening to cut off American funding to the U.N.

Gingrich writes:

The United States has the leverage to prevent this diplomatic disaster if the Obama Administration wants to use it: we are by far the largest donor to the U.N., financing roughly a quarter of its entire budget.

We should be willing to say that if the U.N. is going to circumvent negotiations and declare the territory of one of its own members an independent state, we aren't going to pay for it. We can keep our $7.6 billion a year.

We don't need to fund a corrupt institution to beat up on our allies.

Gingrich explains that back in 1989, the administration of President George H.W. Bush used the same approach with the U.N. to prevent the extension of statehood to the Palestinians.

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Debates

Iowa Showdown: Five Stories To Watch In Tonight's GOP Debate

Benjy Sarlin | August 11, 2011, 6:00AM

Jon Huntsman, Mitt Romney, Herman Cain, Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN)

You might say that 2012 really starts tonight. At 9pm Eastern time, the declared Republican presidential candidates take the stage at Iowa -- barely two days ahead of the Ames Straw Poll, which many consider the unofficial first round of the primary season.

Of course, this debate will also be interesting for who it doesn't have: Texas Governor Rick Perry. Today he made it official that he'll be declaring his candidacy on Saturday. His shadow is sure to loom large over tonight's proceedings.

TPM's livewire will keep you updated of the night's events as they happen. We'll also be posting blog posts, fuller articles, and video throughout the evening.

Meanwhile, in preparation for the debate itelf, here's TPM's advice on what to look for:

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Paul Krugman

Huh? Newt Declares Obama 'A Paul Krugman Presidency'

Benjy Sarlin | August 2, 2011, 12:09PM

Newt Gingrich took to FOX News Monday night to compare President Obama to, of all people, Paul Krugman, one of the White House's fiercest critics.

"This is a Paul Krugman presidency," Gingrich told Bill O'Reilly. "[Obama] believes that stuff. He actually believes in left-wing economic ideas. The only problem with them is that they don't work."

It was an odd comparison, given that the New York Times columnist has staked out a position as Obama's ultimate nemesis on the left since the very earliest days of his administration.

"If only!" Krugman replied by e-mail, when asked about Newt's claim by TPM.

Krugman made the cover of Newsweek in Obama's very first year in office as part of a profile entitled "OBAMA IS WRONG: The Loyal Opposition of Paul Krugman." Politico's Mike Allen labeled him the "anti-Obama."

At the time of the Newsweek story, Krugman was arguing in his column that Obama's stimulus plan was too small to prevent massive, prolonged unemployment and that the White House had failed to get tough enough on big finance. Needless to say, the stalling recovery today and Obama's recent interest in negotiating multi-trillion dollar spending cuts hasn't led Krugman to change his tone. One recent post recast the president as "Barack Herbert Hoover Obama."

"This is truly a tragedy: the great progressive hope (well, I did warn people) is falling all over himself to endorse right-wing economic fallacies," he wrote.

Update: Krugman has a blog post up entitled "Bwahahahaha, Newt Edition."

"Yes, I'm secretly giving Barack marching orders, and only pretending to be deeply frustrated by his actions and rhetoric," he writes. "Incidentally, those 'left-wing economic ideas' are Economics 101; and try stacking up my economic predictions over the past few years against any of Gingrich's favorites."

This story has been updated.

Newt Gingrich

Newt Gingrich Caught With Foreign-Made Campaign Gear (VIDEO)

Evan McMorris-Santoro | July 28, 2011, 8:51AM

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-GA)

If Newt Gingrich's 2012 campaign is good for anything, it's as a tutorial in what not to do as a conservative Republican running for president. And yesterday -- right into a TV camera -- Gingrich gave yet another master class.

ABC News, it seems, is calling out candidates for hawking campaign gear not made in the USA. The liability of pushing foreign-made buttons, t-shirts and the like in this cycle is obvious: ask any candidate and they'll tell you the number one facing the electorate is jobs. Dumping campaign contribution money overseas to pay for cheaply-made trinkets isn't exactly what you'd call "on message."

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2012

Newt Says His Ad With Pelosi Was 'Miscontrued'

Benjy Sarlin | July 26, 2011, 9:57AM

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-GA)

For Newt Gingrich, the most devastating attack ad against his campaign is self-inflicted: a 2006 PSA for climate change that he cut with then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi. At the time Republicans from President Bush on down were moving to the center on the issue, but in recent years the GOP has purged virtually all pro-environment sentiment among its members. Now Gingrich is trying to catch up with the times by disavowing his old ad.

"I was trying to make a point that we shouldn't be afraid to have a debate with the left, even on the environment," Gingrich told WGIR radio on Tuesday. "Obviously it was misconstrued, and it's probably one of those things I wouldn't do again."

Gingrich probably would not be welcome back for another ad: he has repeatedly called for an end to the Environmental Protection Agency in recent months. As for whether he was misunderstood, you can watch the ad below:

Newt Gingrich

Newt Gingrich's Private Plane Flights Responsible For Nearly Half Of $1M Debt

Ryan J. Reilly | July 15, 2011, 6:30PM

Newt Gingrich's presidential campaign is over $1 million in debt, nearly half of which -- $451,946 -- is attributable to his preference for private jets.

That's how much the Gingrich campaign owes to Moby Dick Airways, the same company he used for flights paid for by his former 527 group, American Solutions. In April, May and June of last year, American Solutions gave $677,539 to Moby Dick Airways.

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Newt Gingrich

Newt Gingrich 2012 Already $1 Million In Debt

Evan McMorris-Santoro | July 15, 2011, 3:00PM

The bad news just keeps on coming for former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, whose bid for the Republican presidential nomination has become an instant classic for train wreck aficionados.

The AP reports Gingrich's campaign is more than $1 million in debt, already.

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2012 elections

Vander Plaats: Romney 'Has Been All Over The Board'

Eric Kleefeld | July 13, 2011, 4:41PM

Bob Vander Plaats

TPM spoke with Bob Vander Plaats, the Iowa conservative activist and former gubernatorial candidate who has pitched the "Marriage Vow" pledge for presidential candidates competing in the state caucuses. And while he's not too perturbed that Newt Gingrich and Tim Pawlenty are not signing it (at least not yet), he's got some pretty strong words for Mitt Romney.

Tuesday night, Romney's campaign slammed the pledge, saying that it "contained references and provisions that were undignified and inappropriate for a presidential campaign.

"One of the reasons we put the pledge together was for a person or candidate like Gov. Romney," Vander Plaats told TPM, "because it's been well documented that Gov. Romney has been all over the board when it comes to marriage, or abortion, or universal health care."

Vander Plaats also added: "These types of no-commitments on my part to marriage and family, I don't think that's going to do his campaign any favors in the state of Iowa.

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Mitt Romney

GOP Presidential Field Not On Board With McConnell's Escape Plan

Benjy Sarlin | July 12, 2011, 4:48PM

The 2012 Republican presidential candidates are starting to weigh in on Sen. Mitch McConnell's (R-KY) plan to hand the White House authority over the debt ceiling and so far the reviews are not good.

Asked by TPM for their take, Mitt Romney's campaign e-mailed to "reiterate" the candidate's demands for a debt limit deal.

"Mitt Romney does not believe the federal debt limit should be raised without tying it to spending cuts, budget caps and a balanced budget amendment," spokeswoman Andrea Saul said.

On Twitter, Newt Gingrich threw caution to the wind and accused McConnell of selling out conservatives.

"McConnell's plan is an irresponsible surrender to big government, big deficits and continued overspending. I oppose it," he wrote.

In an ironic twist, reports indicate that McConnell's office is modeling their plan after the 1996 Congressional Review Act, which House and Senate Republicans attached to a $600 billion debt ceiling increase back when Gingrich was Speaker. The legislation allowed Congress to pass resolutions disapproving of agency rules that the White House could then veto, but did not affect presidential authority over the debt limit.

2012 elections

Gingrich Seeking To Tweak 'Marriage Vow' -- From Iowa Conservative Group

Eric Kleefeld | July 11, 2011, 6:31PM

Newt Gingrich

Newt Gingrich has decided not to sign -- at least, not sign as of yet -- an Iowa conservative group's controversial 'Marriage Vow' pledge for Republican presidential candidates to personally and publicly uphold heterosexual monogamy and sexual morality.

"We're happy to work with you to sharpen it so people understand where we're going with it," Gingrich told Family Leader head Bob Vander Plaats, according to Gingrich spokesman R.C. Hammond, in a National Journal report. "It's not there yet."

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Barack Obama

Is Tweeting Unpresidential? Obama Will Hold Twitter Town Hall But Will Not Tweet

Susan Crabtree | July 6, 2011, 5:45AM

President Barack Obama

President Obama will hold his first ever Twitter town hall Wednesday at 2 p.m., but there is little if any chance the tweeting of this presidency will result in the same sort of online mishaps that make the new social medium such a tempting but dangerous place for many pols.

The White House and Twitter, which is co-hosting the Tweet-up, is taking measures to ensure there's no chance Obama will fall prey to some of the Twitter mishaps that have ensnared the likes of Sarah Palin (who memorably and quite unintentionally coined the new word "refudiate" in one tweet) and former Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-NY) who showed just how easily Twitter can get you into trouble by a simple slip of the mouse or misdirected twitpic.

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Newt Gingrich

Expect More Bad News For Newt Gingrich In Fundraising Numbers

Evan McMorris-Santoro | July 5, 2011, 9:56AM

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-GA) with wife, Callista.

Between now and July 15, we'll get (almost) the full picture of campaign fundraising from the opening round of the 2012 presidential contest. And if you're looking for a stunning turnaround from Newt Gingrich, don't hold your breath.

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2012 elections

Six Months, Seven Fails: The Opening Round Of Campaign 2012 (VIDEO)

Evan McMorris-Santoro | July 1, 2011, 2:43PM

Tim Pawlenty (R-MN), Sarah Palin (R-AK), Michele Bachmann (R-MN), Herman Cain (R-TN)

Running for president is hard. Candidates have to be focused, dedicated and possess an almost unfathomable amount of vanity. It also takes a healthy appetite for shoe leather -- you're gonna put your foot directly in your mouth, usually on national television, more than few times before all is said and done.

At the end of June, campaign 2012 is coming along nicely on that front. We've seen candidates (and potential candidates) choke up on a debate stage, claim Paul Revere rang bells, scream at reporters on camera, flip-flop mightily and even misspell their own names at their own kickoffs. If the first six months of the presidential campaign trail are any guide, it's going to be an exceptionally fun year.

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Sarah Palin

Iron Lady Margaret Thatcher Casts Shadow Over GOP Primaries

Benjy Sarlin | June 28, 2011, 5:45AM

They say the sun never sets on an English friendship. Certainly that's the case in the Republican primary this year, where Ronald Reagan's partnership with Margaret Thatcher comes up often in speeches, interviews, and even campaign slogans.

Britain's "Iron Lady," famed for her free market ideals and tough-minded style of governance, has always been a popular figure in Republican circles across the pond, but she seems to have taken on new relevance in recent years for the party's leading lights. While George W. Bush identified strongly with wartime Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, as he struggled to prosecute the War on Terror, national security has fallen far down the list of priorities for the party and the field is significantly divided on foreign policy. Instead, the focus is on the weak economy, which is clearly Maggie's wheelhouse.

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Newt Gingrich

Newt Gingrich: Obama Is So Bad, Black People Will Vote Republican

Evan McMorris-Santoro | June 24, 2011, 6:30AM

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-GA)

BALTIMORE, MD -- Newt Gingrich fired up the crowd in this blue state with the promise that President Obama is so bad that he's made it possible for the Republicans to win over the African American vote in 2012.

[TPM SLIDESHOW: Newt Gingrich Through The Ages]

Gingrich stopped off at an airport Marriott near Baltimore Thursday to keynote the Maryland GOP's annual Red, White & Blue banquet. Before the speech, he assured reporters that his campaign was still going strong. When he took the podium, he offered Republican donors a long, dense speech full of red meat and warnings about the state of the world around us.

He also said it was time for Republicans to tell African Americans how terrible Obama has been for them.

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Newt Gingrich

Newt Gingrich: I'll Still Be Here When Iowa Caucuses

Evan McMorris-Santoro | June 23, 2011, 9:01PM

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-GA)

NEAR BALTIMORE, MD -- Newt Gingrich still has a press guy. The staffer ended up waylaying some reporters briefly while they waited for the former House Speaker to walk from the VIP room to the banquet hall at the Maryland GOP's annual Red, White and Blue Dinner here Thursday night. He slipped past.

Gingrich is the keynote speaker, and thanks to one wily member of the press corps from Huffington Post, Gingrich ended up taking press questions anyway. The theme, not surprisingly, was the viability of Gingrich's lagging presidential campaign.

Rumors of its demise, Gingrich said, are greatly exaggerated.

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2012 elections

Gingrich On Staff Resignations: 'I Am Very Different From Normal Politicians'

Eric Kleefeld | June 22, 2011, 12:44PM

Newt Gingrich

Newt Gingrich is responding to the continuing wave of staff resignations from his campaign -- saying it's simply because he's just too different of a politician. Also, he's like Reagan.

Reuters reports:

"Philosophically, I am very different from normal politicians, and normal consultants found that very hard to deal with," Gingrich said in a speech to the Atlanta Press Club.

"We have big ideas. I just think that's part of how you campaign. You talk to the American people about big things."

On the other hand, Gingrich also noted that Ronald Reagan himself encountered some turbulence during the 1980 campaign, when 13 of his aides quit the campaign: "If I had to choose Reaganomics or 13 staffers quitting, I think for the average working American, Reaganomics was a much better deal."

2012 elections

Gingrich Had Second Line Of Credit From Tiffany Jewelers

Eric Kleefeld | June 22, 2011, 9:33AM

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-GA) with wife, Callista.

Another (very expensive) shoe has dropped about Newt Gingrich's personal spending. Following reports in May that Gingrich had previously taken a $250,000-$500,000 line of credit from Tiffany & Co. jewelers, it has now been reported that he had another line of credit with the company -- between $500,000 and $1 million.

Chris Cillizza at the Washington Post reports:

Joe DeSantis, a spokesman for Gingrich, said that the candidate's personal financial disclosure filing, which is due within 30 days of his formal entrance into the presidential race, will "show that the Gingriches had a $500,000 to $1 million line of credit at Tiffany's, that it has a zero balance, and it has been closed."

DeSantis added that all debts to Tiffany had been paid in full. He offered no details about when the second line of credit was taken out, what it was used for or when it was closed.

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2012 elections

Report: Gingrich's Campaign Finance Team Quits

Jon Terbush | June 21, 2011, 12:54PM

New Gingrich's struggling presidential campaign has suffered another setback as members of his fundraising team called it quits on Tuesday, according to the AP.

The AP reported that campaign spokesman R.C. Hammond confirmed fundraising director Jody Thomas and fundraising consultant Mary Heitman stepped down from the campaign.

Via the AP:

People familiar with Gingrich's campaign spending say his fundraising has been weak since he launched his bid and that he has racked up large travel bills. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk openly about campaign inner workings.

Those defections are the latest blow to Gingrich's campaign, which already suffered a mass defection just weeks earlier when 16 top aides simultaneously jumped ship.

Climate Change

Meet The New Pollution-Friendly GOP

Benjy Sarlin | June 21, 2011, 5:45AM

GOP Presidential Candidates Debate, Jun 13, 2011

In last week's debate, Republicans got their first look at a GOP field much more openly hostile to the environment than in recent elections, with several candidates openly calling for an end to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). But many of the top contenders have also flirted with eco-friendly policy in the recent past, even if they aren't too quick to proclaim it these days. Making matters more confusing, here's even some overlap between the two camps. So where do the big players stand right now?

On the far end, you have the "Abolish the EPA" crowd. These were the loudest and most noteworthy voices at the New Hampshire debate.

"What we need to do is pass the mother of all repeal bills, but it's the repeal bill that will get a job killing regulations," Michele Bachmann said at the event. "And I would begin with the EPA, because there is no other agency like the EPA. It should really be renamed the job-killing organization of America."

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Iowa caucus

Still No Iowa Staff For Gingrich

Eric Kleefeld | June 20, 2011, 1:30PM

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-GA)

Newt Gingrich's campaign appears to still be reeling from the mass resignation of many top staffers a week and a half ago. As the Des Moines Register reports, Gingrich has yet to put in place new staff in the key caucus state of Iowa.

Gingrich's entire paid Iowa staff were among the mass resignations. Gingrich spokesman R.C. Hammond told the Register that the campaign is searching for a new staff, but declined to discuss any specifics.

Meanwhile, the paper had trouble finding any prominent evidence of the staff search -- and instead found evidence that key Iowa GOP activists are not taking the campaign seriously.

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Newt Gingrich

The Incredible Shrinking Newt: Gingrich's Support Crumbling In Polls

Jon Terbush | June 16, 2011, 5:45AM

Newt Gingrich has found one issue Americans of all political stripes can come together over: their mutual dislike of him.

When the race to 2012 first started to gain steam early this year, Gingrich was seen as a viable contender, a big-name Republican with a strong brand and the cash to back a White House bid. But after a bungled rollout marred by gaffes and controversies, the always polarizing Gingrich has alienated not just Democrats, but his own party as well.

Over the past few months -- essentially, shortly after he made his campaign official -- Gingrich's favorability rating has plummeted with Republicans.

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Newt Gingrich

Poll: Gingrich's Support Implodes With GOP Voters

Jon Terbush | June 15, 2011, 2:35PM

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-GA)

Since formally announcing that he would seek the presidency, Newt Gingrich's support has completely fallen apart among members of his own party, according to a forthcoming NBC/Wall Street Journal poll.

In an early look at that survey published Wednesday afternoon, NBC News said that a plurality of Republicans now have an unfavorable opinion of Gingrich, with 34% viewing the former Speaker of the House unfavorably, compared to 32% who view him favorably. That's a huge shift from just two months ago when 50% of GOPers liked Gingrich, while only 13% did not.

Further, 48% of all Americans now view Gingrich unfavorably according to the poll, an all time high that topped even his worst marks from his days in Congress, during the push for President Clinton's impeachment.

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2012 elections

Gingrich On Staff Resignations: 'I Frankly Feel Liberated' (VIDEO)

Eric Kleefeld | June 15, 2011, 10:43AM

Newt Gingrich

Appearing Tuesday night on Sean Hannity's TV show, Newt Gingrich brushed off the recent mass resignation of many of his top staffers. In response, Gingrich said that this occurred because his vision of an inclusive, grassroots campaign was too different from the traditional Republican model -- and that he feels "liberated" now.

"Look, I think that was the key to it, Sean: My vision -- the one that I learned with Goldwater in '64, learned with Reagan in '76 and '80, that you saw in '93, '94, with the Contract with America. My vision is of a people-oriented grassroots campaign where Newt.org becomes the center of new solutions, new ideas, new energy -- a campaign that's inclusive, that brings together everybody in America, of every ethnic background, who wants to change Washington.

"And I think that that was so different from the normal Republican model, that there just wasn't a fit. I frankly feel liberated.

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2012

Muslims, Medicare, And Mandates: The Top 5 Moments From The GOP Debate

Benjy Sarlin | June 14, 2011, 5:45AM

GOP Presidential Candidates Debate, Jun 13, 2011

OK, so the fireworks weren't quite there on Monday. The candidates seemed more concerned with introducing their dozens of grandchildren and out-doing each other's attacks on President Obama than in directly addressing each other. But the GOP debate produced some illuminating moments, from Tim Pawlenty's awkward avoidance of a confrontation with Mitt Romney to Herman Cain's plan to root out "violent" Muslims. Without further ado, here are the top five highlights:

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2012

Newt Gingrich: I'm Not Dead!

Benjy Sarlin | June 13, 2011, 11:16AM

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-GA)

Newt Gingrich reassured Republican voters that his presidential campaign was still ticking despite the loss of nearly its entire senior staff in a coordinated mass resignation last week.

"I will carry the message of American renewal to every part of this great land," Gingrich said in a speech on Sunday to the Republican Jewish Coalition in Beverly Hills. "And with the help of every American who wants to change Washington, we will prevail."

Gingrich's speech was his first public appearance in weeks after taking off on a European cruise with wife Callista. His campaign, already in grave condition after Gingrich labeled Paul Ryan's Medicare plan "right wing social engineering" on Meet The Press, suffered another blow during his absence when 16 aides quit at once in protest over Newt's strategy.

Gingrich alluded to their departure in his speech, according to Politico. "I know full well the rigors of campaigning for public office," he said. "in fact, I've had some recent reminders."

Asked by reporters afterwards whether his campaign was still viable, he replied "Go ask the voters."

Tim Pawlenty

Will T-Paw's Radical Tax Plan Become The GOP Gold Standard?

Brian Beutler | June 13, 2011, 9:36AM

Former Gov. Tim Pawlenty (R-MN)

Last week, Tim Pawlenty unveiled a plan to overhaul the tax code that would make Paul Ryan wince. But as radical as his proposal is, it could easily become the baseline for what it takes to pass muster in the GOP presidential primary. And that would carry enormous consequences for the general election and beyond.

We'll get a first glimpse of how Pawlenty's GOP rivals react to his proposal at tonight's debate. Do they embrace the underlying principles of the plan so that Pawlenty doesn't outflank them on the right? Or do they try to one up him with even more dramatic overhauls of the tax code?

Pawlenty proposes to reduce the top individual income tax rate from 35 percent to 25 percent, cut the top corporate rate from 25 percent to 15 percent, and allow pass-through corporations to pay taxes at the corporate rate. He also wants to completely eliminate capital gains taxes, taxes on dividends and interest, and the estate tax.

Altogether, according to the Tax Policy Center, it would cost the Treasury over $11 trillion over the course of a decade -- most of which would benefit the wealthiest Americans. It's a recipe for either a catastrophic budget crisis, or a fundamental dismantling of the public sector's role in American life, or both.

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