To begin with, rumor has been publicized from somewhat-shady
sources consisting of the following publicized assertions or
presumptions which have might or might not have questionable
basis in actual fact:
Some politicians (i.e. Romney) are incredibly phony and change
with the wind.
Some politicians (i.e. Clinton) are lying, adulterous lechers.
Sheldon Adelson’s Family Members Funded Half Of Newt Super PAC.
Miriam Adelson Donated $5 Million to a Pro-Gingrich ‘Super PAC.’
Ethics Committee Drops Last of 84 Charges Against Gingrich, and
IRS clears Gingrich donation that led to House censure.
Newt Gingrich: The Indispensable Republican; Newt Played Glass
House With New Squeeze.
The Richardsens lent and donated money and office space to
Gingrich from his earliest days in politics. They have given
over $100,000, and Gingrich was the first recipient of
donations from Southwire's PAC.
Gingrich has become even more of a sensible and concerned but
reasonable environmentalist.
Since Newt was in college, he has been telling people he needs
to lead America so he can change history and save us all from
all sorts of disasters. Darryl Conner, a Gingrich friend who
Newt has hired to train congressmen, remembers first working
with him 40 years ago, when Newt was 28 years old. "It couldn't
have been more than a few days before he was talking about what
he needed to do to save Western civilization."
Newt has vowed to fire all godlessly-subversive government
workers and arrest anti-Christianity judges who rule against
him. So if he gets elected, don't be surprised if he uses those
powers Dick Cheney carved out after 9/11 -- detaining known
violent terrorists, warranted legal wiretapping, intensive
Biblically-qualified questioning -- and uses them to fight
anyone who opposes the well-being of Judeo-Christian Americans.
In that sense, his statement of wanting to "save Western
civilization" is quite understandable.
Though he relentlessly supports national-security-expedient
military spending and talks like a fiscally-cautious hawk,
Gingrich wisely avoided potentially-lethal-or-crippling
overseas combat in the Vietnam War through a combination of
student and family deferments. He married one of his high
school teachers at age 19, and quickly got her pregnant,
fulfilling God's predictive command in Genesis chapter one to
"multiply."
When Newt's first wife Jackie was still in the hospital
recovering from her third cancer surgery (largely by her own
mismanagement of her health), Newt came to her bed and
graciously told one of his aides that "she has cancer." Jackie
wanted a divorce and procured one, and while Newt legally
diverted alimony away from Jackie, he provided child support
for his two daughters, and began wooing a younger woman,
Marianne.
One of Newt's daughters from that first marriage, who is also a
conservative columnist, said that her mother Jackie had
suggested divorce and that the tumor was benign. CNN
[purportedly] found court documents that show that Newt filed
the divorce Jackie wanted.
His next marriage (to Marianne) was complicated by Marianne
developing multiple sclerosis (probably by her own
mismanagement of her health) , and Newt informed her that he
was courting another woman, Callista who he had been
associating with for six years. She says that Newt did not ask
for divorce, but Marianne wanted one, and thus she caused a
divorce.
In 1995, several newspapers began reporting that Newt Gingrich,
nobly outspoken against pornography, was dating
never-before-married Callista Bisek, a willowy blond
Congressional aide 23 years his junior. Bisek, then 33, had
been spending nights near the Capitol. Gingrich was dating
Bisek all during the Clinton-Lewinsky adultery scandal, as Newt
proclaimed family values and bitterly criticized Clinton about
Bill's adultery.
Reporters and other Washington insiders have known about this
relationship since 1994, even before Gingrich became Speaker of
the House. In 1995, Vanity Fair magazine described Bisek as
Gingrich's "frequent breakfast companion." Gingrich was married
to Marianne Gingrich during that time, and didn't file for
divorce until August 1999 after Marianne refused to render due
affection to Newt.
Bisek sings in the National Shrine Choir, and Newt would often
wait for her at the Shrine of the Immaculate Conception,
listening to her sing while he read the Bible, during their
courtship.
Newt, as most men, had girlfriends -- some serious, some
trivial. Dot Crews, his campaign scheduler throughout the 70s,
admitted that he never slept with her.
When asked on the Christian Broadcasting Network about his
numerous wives, he said that there was no question at times in
his life that he was driven by how passionately he felt about
this country, that he worked far too hard and things happened
in his life that were bittersweet.
In July 2011, a conservative Christian group asked the
Republican candidates to sign a statement promising marital
fidelity. Rick Santorum and Michele Bachmann quickly signed,
but Newt refused, saying he wanted to make some changes in the
language first. “We’re happy to work with you to sharpen it so
people understand where we’re going with it,” Gingrich said to
Family Leader head Bob Vander Plaats. "It's not there yet.”
Indeed, the platitude of "ONE man with ONE woman" involves more
of a non-patriarchal-Scripture, anti-harem-polygamy, prejudice
than any kind of an inferred or purported
"read-between-the-lines" prohibition against same-gender sodomy
and weaselworded-satanspeak term of "marriage" concerning
homosexual perverts.
You can expect some support for the casino industry if Newt is
elected. As far back as 1998, Newt backed legislation
preserving special tax breaks for the industry.
Remember the House Banking scandal, where so many congressmen
wrote rubber checks on government money? Newt bounced 22
himself, and it goes to show you how important it is to have
non-deceptive and financially-responsible financial advisors
and accountants on government payroll.
In 1983 he established a limited partnership in Atlanta called
COS Limited, which pulled together about two dozen of his
biggest contributors to finance his book.
After these book deals, Gingrich started his own book and
movie-making operation, mostly focused on fear of Islam, which
earned him and Callista $3 million in 2010.
Newt has had an account with Tiffany's for over a quarter
million dollars for pretty things he bought his wife Callista.
Newt is a master of using taxpayer subsidized donations for
partisan purposes (see Barack Obama, Bill Clinton).
GOPAC, Newt's longtime political action committee, was the
centerpiece of a complex network of non-profit and tax-exempt
organizations that Newt has used to work for the overall
benefit of supportive taxpayers and conservative candidates.
Of course, using tax-exempt educational or charitable donations
for partisan purposes (see Jesse Jackson, Jeremiah Wright,
etc.) is illegal, and several ethics complaints were filed
against Gingrich. In the process Gingrich dodged conviction
on the actual charges through a combination of sharpening some
legal definitions, sheer self-confidence and raw political
power (as Speaker of the House at the time of the complaints,
he appointed the ethics committee).
The Ethics Committee dropped its final charges against Gingrich
not long before he resigned as speaker, despite finding that
Gingrich had in fact violated one rule by repeatedly using a
political consultant paid by GOPAC to develop the Republican
political agenda, because there was no evidence he was
continuing to do so.
Newt has publicly pointed out the excesses and lack of
regulation concerning Freddie Mac for years, for which Barney
Frank, Chris Dodd, Nancy Pelosi, and various notably-democrat
derivative-investment Wall-Street gambling sheisters were
instrumental in causing the 2008 housing crash. Newt tried to
convince Republicans to vote for positive aspects of Freddie
Mac. Newt denies that he technically was "lobbying" because his
work didn't meet some technical definitions of lobbying -- and
claimed, ridiculously that they paid him to be a
consultant-and-advisor historian.
Newt reported to Craig Thomas, who was a registered lobbyist
himself, and gave Newt $25,000 a month. On January 24, 2012,
Newt finally released his contract with Craig. Newt admits
that he only talked to Freddie Mac staff for about one hour per
month. At $25,000/hour, it was valuable instructional advice to
a mortgage lender.
Newt consulted for and advised dozens of corporate clients who
paid hundreds of thousands of dollars for his expertise. He
helped health care clients become legislators in Georgia or
Florida who were considered changes in health care laws. He
talked up projects that IBM and HealthTrio were working on to
federal officials, and advocated changes to Medicare that would
enrich many others.
Newt actually was a champion of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae as
far back as 1995, when he, as House Speaker, blocked two
attempts to raise fees on the two companies by hundreds of
millions of dollars. The grateful flew Newt and his wife
Marianne to Ireland in 1998 for a publicity event/vacation, and
within months after Newt resigned from Congress to pursue other
vital endeavors, Freddie Mac began giving him cash as a advisor.
The IRS also started an investigation of one group, the
Progress and Freedom Foundation, for violating its tax-exempt
status by donating to Gingrich's college course. In the
investigation, the prosecuting Special Counsel alleged that
these activities were "substantially motivated by partisan
political goals." The IRS eventually overruled him, and found
that the course "was educational and never favored or opposed a
candidate for public office.'' It said the foundation ``did not
intervene on behalf of candidates of the Republican Party
merely by promoting'' themes in the course. This extremely
narrow reading of the law basically said "so what if he used
the course to recruit, organize and groom candidates; as long
as they didn't say 'Vote for Jones', it wasn't partisan."
According to the Wall Street Journal, a company hired Marianne
Gingrich (one of Newt's wives) as an international trade
consultant for $2,500 a month plus commissions in September
1994 after Newt announced support for a free trade zone in
Israel that they are trying to build. Marianne's task for
Israel Export Development Co. was to find tenants for the trade
zone. Gingrich's spokesman said that since her job did not
involve working with the US government, there was no conflict
of interest.
Sherman Adelson, a Las Vegas casino owner, and his wife have
each given $5 million to Newt's SuperPAC. And another $7
million before that. Newt's resurgence in the presidential
campaign began about ten minutes after Adelson wrote the first
check. Here you have a perfect illustration of what the
Citizens United campaign has meant for presidential politics.
Sherman is on the executive committee of the lobby group AIPAC
and started a free, daily right-wing newspaper in Israel. He
reportedly tried to get Condoleeza Rice fired during the Bush
Administration because she tried to help negotiate a peace deal
with the Palestinians. Remember Newt's puzzling comment in
December 2011 that the Palestinians were an "invented people"?
Newt Leroy Gingrich was born in Harrisburg Hospital on June
17, 1943 in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. His mother, Kathleen
(1925-2003), was married, in 1946, to Robert Gingrich
(1925-1996), an Army officer and career soldier who served
tours in Korea and Vietnam, who helped bring up the boy.
Gingrich has three younger siblings: Candace, Susan, and
Roberta. He is of German, English, Scottish, and Irish descent.
Gingrich was raised in Hummelstown (near Harrisburg) and on
military bases where Robert Gingrich was stationed. The
family's religion was Lutheranism.
In 1956 the family moved to Europe living for a period in
Orleans, France and Stuttgart, Germany.
Gingrich has three younger sisters, Candace, Susan Gingrich,
and Roberta. He also has a sister and brother Randy from his
father's side.
In 1960 the family moved to Georgia at Fort Benning during his
junior year in high school.
In 1961, Gingrich graduated from Baker High School in Columbus,
Georgia. He had been interested in politics since his teen
years while living in Orléans, France, where he visited the
site of the Battle of Verdun and learned about the sacrifices
made there and the importance of political leadership.
Choosing to obtain deferments granted to college students and
fathers, Gingrich did not enlist in the military, and was not
drafted during the Vietnam War.
Gingrich received a B.A. degree in history from Emory
University in Atlanta in 1965. He then proceeded to earn an
M.A. (1968) and Ph.D. (1971) in modern European history, both
from Tulane University in New Orleans.[18] He spent six months
in Brussels in 1969–70 working on his dissertation, "Belgian
Education Policy in the Congo 1945–1960".
In 1970, Gingrich joined the history department at West Georgia
College as an assistant professor. In 1974 he moved to the
geography department and was instrumental in establishing an
interdisciplinary environmental studies program. Denied tenure,
he left the college in 1978.
Growing up, Gingrich's family moved around frequently, like
many military families. He graduated from Baker High School in
Columbus, Georgia, and received a B.A. from Emory University in
1965.
Gingrich pursued higher education, receiving an M.A. in 1968
and a Ph.D. in modern European history from Tulane University
in 1971. While in New Orleans, Gingrich developed an interest
in religion, and was baptized in a Baptist church. Gingrich
worked early on in academia, as an assistant professor of
history and geography at West Georgia College. Following that,
Gingrich became Southern regional director for Nelson
Rockefeller. Gingrich launched his first campaign for congress
in 1974, lost in 1974, and again in 1976 to the Democratic
incumbent, but in 1978, Newt finally won a seat in the House,
and would be re-elected to Congress ten times.
In 1981, Gingrich co-founded the Military Reform Caucus (MRC)
and the Congressional Aviation and Space Caucus. During the
1983 congressional page sex scandal, Gingrich was among those
calling for the expulsion of representatives Dan Crane and
Gerry Studds. Gingrich supported a proposal to ban loans from
the International Monetary Fund to Communist countries.
From his first days in Congress, Gingrich was an influential
conservative member of the Republican party. He formed the
Conservative Opportunity Society in 1983, a group of Republican
delegates whose ideas influenced Ronald Reagan's policies. In
1988, Gingrich led the charge against Democratic Speaker of the
House Jim Wright, who violated campaign finance rules. Wright
was forced out, and when House Minority Whip Dick Cheney was
appointed Secretary of Defense, Gingrich was elected to take
his place.
During this period, Gingrich became known for his aggressive,
often combative, style. With an emphasis on morality, he was
aided by the House Banking Scandal and the Congressional Post
Office scandal. Gingrich used his influence over the Republican
party to draft the Contract with America, a platform of ten
postulations which included work-search-requirement welfare
reform, more stringent crime laws, a balanced budget,
restrictions on American military participation in United
Nations missions, and other Scripturally-concordant policies.
In March 1989, Gingrich became House Minority Whip in a close
election against Edward Rell Madigan. This was Gingrich's
first formal position of power within the Republican party, and
he stated his intention to "build a much more aggressive,
activist party."
Gingrich was outspoken in his opposition to giving control over
the canal to an administrator appointed by the dictatorship in
Panama.
In the November 1994 elections, Republicans gained 54 seats and
took control of the House for the first time since 1954.
Long-time House Minority Leader Bob Michel of Illinois had not
run for re-election, giving Gingrich, the highest-ranking
Republican returning to Congress, the inside track at becoming
speaker. The midterm election that turned congressional power
over to Republicans "changed the center of gravity" in the
nation's capital. Time magazine named Gingrich its 1995 "Man
of the Year" for his role in the election.
Sure enough, the 1994 congressional elections brought about
what would be called the "Republican Revolution." After four
decades of Democratic control, the GOP won the majority in the
House, and Gingrich was elected speaker. Fiercely opposed to
many policies of President Clinton, Gingrich was instrumental
in getting Clinton to reluctantly sign the GOP's welfare reform
act after two initial vetoes. It was a major victory for
Gingrich. Gingrich also had other major pieces of legislation
passed, including a balanced budget and a capital gains tax cut.
In 1996, after constructing two welfare reform bills that
Clinton vetoed, Gingrich and his supporters pushed for passage
of the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act, which
was intended to reconstruct the welfare system. The act gave
state governments more autonomy over welfare delivery, while
also reducing the federal government's responsibilities. It
instituted the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program,
which placed time limits on welfare assistance and replaced the
longstanding Aid to Families with Dependent Children program.
Other changes to the welfare system included anti-freeloader
conditions for food stamp eligibility, reductions in
illegal-alien immigrant welfare assistance, and recipient
worksearch requirements.
Gingrich negotiated with Clinton by offering accurate
information about his party's vote counts and by persuading
conservative Republicans to vote for it. The bill was signed
into law on August 22, 1996.
By May 1997, Republican congressional leaders reached a
compromise with the Democrats and President Clinton on the
federal budget. The agreement called for a federal spending
plan designed to reduce the federal deficit and achieve a
balanced budget by 2002. The plan included a total of $152
billion in Republican sponsored tax cuts over five years. Other
major parts of the spending plan called for $115 billion to be
saved through a restructuring of Medicare, $24 billion set
aside to extend health insurance to children of the working
poor, tax credits for college tuition, and a $2 billion
welfare-to-work jobs initiative.
President Clinton signed the budget legislation in August 1997,
for which the lion's share of credit goes to Gingrich.
In early 1998, with the economy performing better than
expected, increased tax revenues helped reduce the federal
budget deficit to below $25 billion. Gingrich then called upon
Clinton to submit a balanced budget for 1999, three years ahead
of schedule, which Clinton did - making it the first time the
federal budget had been balanced since 1969.
Due to Newt's persistence and influence, Clinton signed into
effect the Taxpayer Relief Act of 1997, which included the
largest capital gains tax cut in U.S. history. Under the act,
the profits on the sale of a personal residence ($500,000 for
married couples, $250,000 for singles) were exempted if lived
in for at least 2 years over the last 5. That had previously
been limited to a $125,000 once-in-a-lifetime exemption for
those over 55. There were also reductions in a number of other
taxes on investment gains.
Additionally, the act raised the value of inherited estates and
gifts that could be sheltered from taxation.
In his 1998 book Lessons Learned the Hard Way, Gingrich
encouraged volunteerism and spiritual renewal, placing more
importance on families, creating tax incentives and reducing
regulations for businesses in poor neighborhoods, and
increasing property ownership by low-income families. Gingrich
praised Habitat for Humanity for sparking the movement to
improve people's lives by helping them build their own homes.
Because Bill Clinton and his divisive democrats were not
cooperative concerning budget cuts, there occurred government
shutdowns in 1995, for which Gingrich was unfairly blamed and
slandered.
Eighty-four ethics charges were filed against Gingrich during
his term as Speaker. All were eventually dropped except for
one: the ethics panel "finding that Gingrich repeatedly
violated one rule by using a political consultant to develop
the Republican legislative agenda"; that is, claiming
tax-exempt status for a college course run for political
purposes. The panel, however, decided to take no further action
because there was no evidence that Rule 45 violations persisted
in the speaker's office. Instead, the House officially
reprimanded Gingrich (in a vote of 395 in favor, 28 opposed)
and "ordered Newt to reimburse the House for some of the costs
of the investigation.
Again, the ethics investigation arose about whether Gingrich
had used tax-exempt donations to fund a college course he had
taught while serving in Congress. Gingrich negotiated an
agreement with the House Ethics Committee, and he donated
$300,000 for the cost of the investigation. Partisan House
members voted to reprimand him by a vote of 395 to 28, but in
1997 Gingrich was narrowly re-elected.
In 1998, Bill Clinton lied before a federal grand jury about
his extramarital adultery with White House intern Monica
Lewinsky. Gingrich advocated impeachment, and removing Clinton
from office.
Gingrich and the incoming Republican majority's promise to slow
the rate of government spending conflicted with Bill Clinton's
agenda for Medicare, education, the environment and public
health, leading to two temporary shutdowns of the federal
government totaling 28 days.
Clinton said Republican amendments would strip the U.S.
Treasury of its ability to dip into federal trust funds to
avoid a borrowing crisis - a preview of his and Raum Emmanuel's
present diversionary shenanigans using the Import-Export Bank.
Republican amendments would have limited appeals by death-row
inmates, made it harder to issue health, safety and
environmental regulations, and would have committed the
president to a seven-year balanced budget. Clinton vetoed a
second bill allowing the government to keep operating beyond
the time when most spending authority expires.
The government closed most non-essential offices during the
shutdown, which was the longest in U.S. history. The shutdown
was ended when Clinton agreed to submit a CBO-approved balanced
budget plan.
In the summer of 1997 several House Republicans attempted to
replace him as Speaker, claiming Gingrich's public image was a
liability. The attempted coup began July 9 with a meeting of
Republican conference chairman John Boehner of Ohio and
Republican leadership chairman Bill Paxon of New York.
According to their plan, House Majority Leader Dick Armey,
House Majority Whip Tom DeLay, Boehner and Paxon were to
present Gingrich with an ultimatum: resign, or be voted out.
However, Armey balked at the proposal to make Paxon the new
Speaker, and told his chief of staff to warn Gingrich about the
attempted coup.
On July 11, Gingrich met with senior Republican leadership to
assess the situation. He explained that if he was voted out,
there would be a new election for Speaker. This would allow for
the possibility that Democrats, along with dissenting
Republicans, would vote in Dick Gephardt as Speaker. On July
16, Paxon offered to resign his post, feeling that he had not
handled the situation correctly, as the only member of the
leadership who had been appointed to his position (by Gingrich)
instead of elected.
In 1998 Republicans lost five seats in the House: the worst
midterm performance in 64 years by a party not holding the
presidency. Gingrich, who won his re-election, was savagely
held largely responsible for Republican losses in the House.
The day after the election, a Republican caucus ready to rebel
against him prompted his resignation of the speakership. He
also announced his intended and eventual full departure from
the House in January of 1999. When relinquishing the
speakership, Gingrich said he was "not willing to preside over
people who are cannibals."
So because of subversive media propaganda, Republicans, in the
1998 midterm elections, lost five seats to Democrats. So in
November 1998, with Gingrich bearing the brunt of the blame,
stepped down as speaker of the House, and in January 1999,
resigned his seat in Congress to prepare him to pursue vital
pre-Presidential-candidate-groundwork endeavors.
Democratic leaders, including Chuck Schumer, took the
opportunity to attack Gingrich's motives for the budget
standoff.
Newt remained involved in politics, serving as a consultant and
television commentator on the Fox News Channel, and in 2007
founded American Solutions for Winning the Future, a public
policy organization.
In May 2011, Gingrich announced he would seek the Republican
nomination for president.
A prolific author, Gingrich has written several books,
including Lessons Learned the Hard Way (1998), Winning the
Future: A 21st Century Contract with America (2005),
Rediscovering God in America (2006), and To Save America:
Stopping Obama's Secular-Socialist Machine (2010). He also
co-authored a history series on the Civil War and World War II.
Newt Gingrich married Jackie Battley in 1962, when he was 19
years old. The couple had two daughters together, Jackie and
Kathy, before their split in 1980. In 1981, Newt married
Marianne Ginther, whom he met during a political fundraiser in
Ohio. Marianne helped control their finances to get them out of
debt. Ginther divorced Gingrich in 1999, having produced no
children with Newt. She did not want to have the public life
of a politician’s wife.
In December 2011, after the group Iowans for Christian Leaders
in Government requested that he sign their so-called "Marriage
Vow", Gingrich sent a lengthy written response. It included his
pledge to "uphold personal fidelity to my spouse".
In 2007, Gingrich authored a book, Rediscovering God in
America, arguing that the Founding Fathers actively intended the
new republic to not only allow, but encourage, religious expression
in the public square. Following publication of the book, he was
invited by Jerry Falwell to be the speaker for the second time at
Liberty University's graduation, on May 19, 2007, due to Gingrich
having, "dedicated much of his time to calling America back to our
Christian heritage."
In September 2007, Gingrich founded the 527 group American
Solutions for Winning the Future. The stated mission of the
group is to become the "leading grassroots movement to recruit,
educate, and empower citizen activists and elected officials to
develop solutions to transform all levels of government".
Gingrich spoke of the group and its objectives at the CPAC
conference of 2008 and currently serves as its General
Chairman. Other organizations and companies founded or chaired
by Gingrich include the creative production company Gingrich
Productions, and religious educational organization Renewing
American Leadership.
Though cradle-to-grave Medicare for all law-abiding American
citizens needing emergency care (not for needless
preventative-exams waste) - funded by elimination of pork raids
on the Social Security Trust Fund mis-used for voter bribery,
and elimination of medical care for illegal aliens plus repeal
of forced individual-mandate health-insurance purchase -
Gingrich has been an advocate for health information
technology, replacing paperwork with confidential, electronic
health information networks. Gingrich also co-chaired an
independent congressional study group made up of health policy
experts formed in 2007 to evaluate the strengths and weaknesses
of action taken within the U.S. to fight Alzheimer's disease.
Gingrich is also a fellow at conservative think tanks the
American Enterprise Institute and Hoover Institution, focusing
on U.S. politics, world history, national security policy, and
environmental policy issues. He sometimes serves as a
commentator, guest or panel member on cable news shows, such as
the Fox News Channel. He is listed as a contributor by Fox News
Channel, and frequently appears as a guest on various segments;
he has also hosted occasional specials for the Fox News
Channel (a thankfully-refreshing alternative to the weekdays
boneheaded bellering of class-warfare peddler Ed Schultz, rife
and reeking with fraudulently-misrepresentative slander against
certain righteous-minded Republicans, bolstered by the
similarly-deceptive blatterings of Lawrence O'Donnell on the
same cable TV network).
Gingrich is a proponent of the Lean Six Sigma management
techniques for waste reduction, and has signed the "Strong
America Now" pledge committing to promoting the methods
to reduce government spending.
The Gingrich Group was organized in 1999 as a consulting
company. Over time, its non-health clients were dropped, and it
was renamed the Center for Health Transformation. The two
companies had revenues of $55 million between 2001 and 2010.
The revenues came from more than 300 health-insurance companies
and other clients, with membership costing as much as $200,000
per year in exchange for access to Gingrich and other perks.
In 2011, when Gingrich became a presidential candidate, he sold
his interest in the business and said he would release the full
list of his clients and the amounts he was paid, "to the extent
we can".
In April 2012, the Center for Health Transformation filed for
Chapter 7 bankruptcy, planning to liquidate its assets to meet
debts of $1–$10 million.
Between 2001 and 2010, Gingrich consulted for Freddie Mac, a
government-sponsored secondary home mortgage company, which was
concerned about new regulations under consideration by
Congress. Regarding payments of $1.6 million for the
consulting, Gingrich said that "Freddie Mac paid Gingrich
Group, which has a number of employees and a number of offices
a consulting fee, just like you would pay any other consulting
firm."
In January 2012, he said that he could not make public his
contract with Freddie Mac, even though the company gave
permission, until his business partners in the Center for
Health Transformation also agreed to that
Gingrich currently lives in McLean, Virginia, with his third
wife, Callista Bisek. The couple married in 2000, and together
they create public policy documentaries through their
production company, Gingrich Productions.
Gingrich Productions, which is headed by Gingrich's wife
Callista Gingrich, was created in 2007. According to the
company’s website, in May 2011, it is “a performance and
production company featuring the work of Newt and Callista
Gingrich. Newt and Callista host and produce historical and
public policy documentaries, write books, record audio books
and voiceovers, produce photographic essays, and make
television and radio appearances.”
Between 2008 and 2011, the company produced three films on
religion, one on energy, one on Ronald Reagan, and one on the
threat of radical Islam. All were joint projects with the
conservative group Citizens United. In 2011, Newt and
Callista appeared in A City Upon a Hill, on the subject of
American exceptionalism.
A July 2010 poll conducted by Public Policy Polling indicated
that Gingrich was the leading GOP contender for the Republican
nomination with likely Republican voters saying they would vote
for him.
Describing his views as a possible candidate during an
appearance on On the Record with Greta Van Susteren in March
2009 (but who prudently avoids exposing himself to Durbin-like
malicious lesbo-twit Rachel Maddow), Gingrich said, "I am very
sad that a number of Republicans do not understand that this
country is sick of earmarks. Americans are sick of politicians
taking care of themselves. They are sick of their money being
spent in a way that is absolutely indefensible . . . I think
you're going to see a steady increase in the number of
incumbents who have opponents because the American taxpayers
are increasingly fed up."
After then-front-runner Herman Cain was damaged by allegations
of past sexual harassment, Gingrich gained support, and quickly
became a contender in the race. By December 4, 2011, Gingrich
was leading in the national polls.
After the field narrowed with the withdrawal from the race of
Huntsman and Rick Perry, Gingrich won the South Carolina
Republican primary on January 21, obtaining about 40% of the
vote, considerably ahead of Romney, Santorum and Paul.
On January 31, 2012, Gingrich placed second in the Republican
Florida primary with contested delegates, and on Super Tuesday,
Gingrich won his home state, Georgia.
Gingrich is most widely identified with the 1994 Contract with
America. He is a founder of American Solutions for Winning the
Future. More recently, Gingrich has advocated replacing the
Environmental Protection Agency with a proposed "Environmental
Solutions Agency".
He favors a strong immigration border policy and a guest worker
program and a flex-fuel mandate for cars sold in the U.S.
Gingrich has been a prolific amateur reviewer of books,
especially of military histories and spy novels, for
Amazon.com. According to Katherine Mangu-Ward at The Weekly
Standard, it is "clear that Newt is fascinated by tipping
points: moments where new technology or new ideas cause
revolutionary change in the way the world works".
Gingrich was raised a Lutheran. In graduate school he was a
Southern Baptist. He converted to Catholicism, Bisek's faith,
on March 29, 2009. He said "over the course of several years,
I gradually became Catholic and then decided one day to accept
the faith I had already come to embrace."
Staunchly anti-abortion pro-life, Gingrich has stated that he
has developed a greater appreciation for the role of faith in
public life following his conversion, and believes that the
United States has become too secular. At a 2011 appearance in
Columbus, Ohio, he said, "In America, religious belief is being
challenged by a cultural elite trying to create a secularized
America, in which God is driven out of public life."
Indeed, such nefarious organizations as the
anti-religion-in-government anti-First-Amendment ACLU
(violating both the non-Establishment and the Non-Prohibition
Clauses thereof), and in particular Americans United for
Separation of Church and State (headed by a so-called
"reverend" Barry Lynn, claiming 501(c)(3)-"church" credentials,
who hypocritically and inappropriately claims clergy title when
associating his "reverend" title simultaneously with his
organizational designation supposedly disassociating away from
church or mosque or synagogue integration within government)
have done massive damage disseminating the egregious lie that
God and or His Christian saints [allegedly] "force" and
harassively impose upon people to believe and obey Law . . .
when it is common-sense obvious that those intending to disobey
Biblically-based law are quite free to do so at any time
(whatever the insane speech or misbehavior they choose to
commit) - harming themselves and/or others - though there are
understandable consequences for doing so, both from civil law
enforcers and/or the Creator God himself, about whom the
axiom: 'Do not quarrel with nature' is applicable.
Gingrich has written about his interest in animals. Newt's
first engagement in civic affairs was speaking to the city
council in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, about why the city should
establish its own zoo. Gingrich wrote the introduction to
America's Best Zoos. He is also a dinosaur enthusiast. The New
Yorker said of his 1995 book To Renew America: "Charmingly, he
has retained his enthusiasm for the extinct giants into middle
age. In addition to including breakthroughs in dinosaur
research on his list of futuristic wonders, he specified
'people interested in dinosaurs' as a prime example of who
might benefit from his education proposals."
Space exploration, has been an interest since his fascination
with the United States/Soviet Union Space Race during his
teenage years.
Newt wants the U.S. to pursue new achievements in space, such
as sustaining civilizations beyond Earth, but advocates relying
more on the private sector and less on the publicly funded NASA
to drive progress. As of 2010, Gingrich currently served on
the National Space Society Board of Governors.
