Gingrich tried to use it in the positive sense as an answer to the attack from Santorum, who obviously used it in the more commom negative sense.
And you are pointing out something pivotal. The connotation of a word can depend on many elements such as inflection, body language as well as the CONTEXT in which it is used.
From the context in which they used the word, it is obviously the two of them had different connotations in mind.
Cheers.
Yep. I haven't seen the exchange yet, but judging from Newt's style with words, he probably turned the definition to his advantage.