Presidio9 posted this on FR..it is worth sharing..This statement brings into question your basic understanding of the subject. The Contract With America was sucessful in every way it was intended. It led directly to the “Republican Revolution” in 1994, which gave us both houses for the first time since 1954. It promised only to bring specific legislation to the floor for vote, which it did. Of course not all the legislation passed, for a variety of reasons, the most significant include the fact that some of them were Constitutional Amendments (which would have required a 2/3 majority) and not all of the Republicans actually signed the contract or voted with it.
In the end, it DID produce a balanced budget, and stopped the flow of power to the Executive branch that has gone unchecked since the FDR administration.
Contrary to popular opinion, Gingrich’s fall from glory had nothing to do with extramarital affairs (which weren’t common knowledge in 1997. Actually, this is where Sarah Palin supporters ought to be willing to give the guy a break. He was hit with 84 ethics violations, 83 of which were thrown out. The one that stuck was a tax violantion related to him teaching a class for a not-for profit. He was stuck with a $300,000 bill for the cost of the investigation, but the panel was unable to agree on whether a violation had occured. Three years later, the IRS cleared him, but the damage had been done. The press had been trying to vilify him as a bad guy. They blamed him for the govenrment shutdown. Now he had pilied up accusations of eithics violations. That, and blowback from the Monica Lewinsky scandal was why the Republicans lost the house in 1998.
Since you appear not to be aware of most of this, I question how much you really know about Newt Gingrich’s romantic life. It is true that Newt married his high school geometry teacher, Jackie Battley, when he was 19 and she was 26. Jackie Battley’s version of the story, relished by the liberal media and now (ironically) Cain supporters, that he blind sided her with divorce papers when she was dying of cancer. However, according to their daughter, their daughter, Jackie Gingrich Cushman, it was her mother who requested the divorce, amd it happened prior to the hospital stay (which was for the removal of a benign tumor, not cancer). None of this excuses Gingrich completely, but before you lob criticims at a fellow human being, you should at least know the full details of those criticisms.
I’m like some others here,liking Newt but not trusting him...I don’t like the fact that he cozied up to the likes of Pelosi,Hillary and Sharpton-THAT really concerns me. What happened in his personal life doesn’t concern me,especially since,as you point out,it happened so many years ago,and there’s always that “he said she said” factor to figure in.It’s just who he chooses to hang around that bothers me.Add to that the fact that he has made some rather controversial comments,and it just makes me hesitate in my support of him.