Sounds like they did to Newt in the 90’s what they did to Palin in Alaska with the 100’s of frivilous ankle-biting lawsuits.
However, Newt has gone on to live another day.
As far as being an “influence peddler” — I’d rather Newt’s influence be peddled than some smarmy Democrat/progressive’s influence.
What’s so bad about being influential?
Newt didn’t have any influence to peddle. As Romney himself pointed out, Newt was overthrown by a “coup” of republicans. Time now shows us they were moderates, who never saw a spending bill they didn’t like, but who in their right mind would think that big-spending republicans would be backstabbing their speaker who had just blocked their spending ways and balanced the budget.