Free Republic

NEW YORK, Dec. 16 (UPI) -- The rise of New Gingrich has turned the Republican presidential race into a two-man affair, but a third of GOP voters say they're still undecided, a poll finds. A Harris poll released Friday indicated with Republicans Sarah Palin, Michele Bachman, Rick Perry and Herman Cain effectively out of the presidential running, the primary has turned into a contest between former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and former House Speaker Gingrich. The survey indicates if it stayed a two-man race, 40 percent of Republicans would vote for Gingrich and 30 percent for Romney, with 30 percent...

HILLSBORO, Missouri -- What if a state held a non-binding presidential primary and the current front-runner for the Republican presidential nomination wasn't on the ballot? That'll happen in Missouri on March 17 and just weeks ago the always correct (except when it's wrong) conventional wisdom insisted this illustrated how former House Speaker Newt Gingrich had no "ground game." And so, it was implied, Gingrich was doomed in his battle against his prime challenger, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney. Until now. If you've been woken up with a "BOOM!" it was the sound of the conventional wisdom imploding. The catalyst was...

Newt Gingrich got into all sorts of trouble a few days ago when he claimed: “There was no Palestine as a state. It was part of the Ottoman Empire. We’ve had an invented Palestinian people who are in fact Arabs and who were historically part of the Arab community. And they had a chance to go many places.” Newt, you’re completely correct, and this is one of the bravest and most intellectually informed things any of the Republican candidates have said so far. Contrary to what you might hear from leftists, labour leaders, students and manipulative Arab activists carefully pulling...

Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich suggested Thursday that being gay is a choice. At least for some people. Asked if people can choose to be gay, Gingrich told the Des Moines Register editorial board that he does not "believe in genetic determinism, and I don't think there is any great evidence of genetic determinism." He said that certain people may choose to be gay if they have certain genetic traits and are raised in a certain environment. "I think people have a significant range of choice within a genetic pattern," he said. "I believe it's a combination of genetics and...

Ideas don't run for president; people do. That's as true today as it was four years ago. So, it is understandable that much of the press and blog coverage of the 2012 GOP primary race has focused on the personalities, experience and record of the candidates rather than their ideas. In fact, until you know the candidates by their actions, you cannot meaningfully judge what their words will mean in practice. Mitt Romney is the prime example of this, having so inconsistent a record that it's impossible to take seriously the idea that he's guided by any sort of coherent...

Surging Newt Gingrich is taking criticism from conservative pundits such as George Will, Peggy Noonan and Charles Krauthammer, who fear he can't beat Barack Obama. If former House Speaker Newt Gingrich is to maintain his place at or near the top of Republican presidential polls, it will be no thanks to the assistance of America's conservative political commentators. Columnists and bloggers of the right have been torching Gingrich with unusual abandon in recent days — charging that the long-tenured politician can't be trusted to adhere to conservative ideals or to stay on message if he is unleashed in a prolonged...

The recent National Review editorial savaging Newt Gingrich and urging that all candidates other than Mitt Romney, Jon Huntsman and Rick Santorum be removed from consideration set off a firestorm in the conservative movement. I tend not to be an “establishment vs. the base”person (for want of better terms) but this primary season has ratcheted up the tension between the groups however you define them. What bothers me about National Review’s stance and others like Jennifer Rubin, George Will and Ann Coulter is the degree to which just about every charge they lay against Gingrich, save a stable family life,...

...Is Paying Money To Tea Party Groups For Their Endorsement I made the part up about the "crying woman," but yes, that is the newest allegation from Ms. Bachmann. Michele Bachmann lives in a strange world. People talk about "moral relativism." Presumably they would claim she's not a moral relativist. But truth is an objective fact, is it not? Ms. Bachmann seems to confuse premises which are politically helpful to her for premises which are actually true. That seems like moral relativism to me -- the world is not as it is, but as I perceive it to be. I...

There have been so many debates during the Republican preseason that it was hard to believe the one hosted by Fox News in Sioux City, Iowa, was the last one before the voting begins. Ratings have been strong, and commentary has been endless: You can imagine a network trying to squeeze in just one more--are you free on Christmas Eve, Governor? It has been a thrilling debate run: Pawlenty crashed; Perry blanked; Romney confronted Perry; Gingrich shined; 9-9-9; Perry blanked. But the Sioux City debate was not an epic contest. It was like the primary race itself: no dominant figure...

Greencastle, Ind. — "Is Palin electable? Absolutely," says Mark Tatge, Eugene S. Pulliam Distinguished Visiting Professor of Journalism at DePauw University, tells the Christian Science Monitor. Tatge is cited in an article headlined "Sarah Palin speaks, but are Americans heeding her anymore?". The professor sees Palin as a viable contender to potentially serve as running mate to Newt Gingrich, should he emerge as the GOP nominee. "Such a partnership is not out of the question,” Tatge tells the publication, adding that he believes that Palin would likely need to "atone for quitting the job of governor." Gloria Goodale writes, "Less-likely...

Via Greg Hengler. This is really just standard treacly intro flattery before a speech, but the Newt fans have been clamoring for it all day — and I don’t blame them. Curiously, last night we endured yet another debate in which Bachmann ended up throwing roundhouses at Mitt Romney’s main competition so that he didn’t have to. Pawlenty, Perry, Cain, and now Gingrich have all taken heavy shots from her in front of the cameras, yet Mitt himself rarely draws anything harsher than the usual boilerplate about mandates which everyone already knows. And even when she lobs that at him,...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nKX2zQbtEQcHere it for those who missed it last night. Newt gave the best possible answer. Obama knows zero American history except what he got off his favorite leftist professors at Harvard and Columbia. While Newt has taught American history and loves the American history of an exceptional nation

OMAHA — With the final presidential debates of the year behind him, Newt Gingrich did not make his case to Iowa voters on Friday, but returned home to spend the weekend off the campaign trail. “I’m pacing,” Mr. Gingrich said, smiling when asked to explain his schedule, with less than three weeks before the Iowa caucuses open the Republican nominating contest. Mr. Gingrich, whose surging candidacy has been marked by his strong debate performances, suddenly has to rely on his organization and a debate-free final stretch of the first chapter of the race. He spent nearly 30 minutes shaking hands...

The hottest argument in Republican circles these days isn’t about immigration, taxes or even health care policy. It’s about New Gingrich and whether nominating him as the party standard-bearer would be disastrous or providential. The pundits and professional consultants have weighed in on the question in a largely negative manner but many of the Republican candidates seeking election to Congress next fall don’t appear to share the concerns the GOP establishment seems to have about the impact Gingrich would have on downballot races as their presidential nominee. A dozen of the GOP’s top recruits to run for Congress, part of...

SIOUX CITY, Iowa -- Mitt Romney had a strategy going into Thursday night's final Republican debate before the January 3 Iowa caucuses. The former Massachusetts governor has been hitting rival Newt Gingrich hard in recent days, calling him "zany" and "unreliable" and even going after Gingrich's infamous Tiffany bills. At the same time, Romney's campaign has sent out a relentless stream of email attacks on Gingrich, many citing a new Romney website devoted to attacking Gingrich, unreliableleader.com. Meanwhile, a pro-Romney super PAC has been slashing Gingrich in ads across Iowa. The effect has been a full-scale Romney assault on the...

Football strategy offers lessons on who is likely to win the presidential race. Winning at football is pretty simple: There’s the offense, the defense, and the special teams. As legendary coach Don James put it while he led the University of Washington Huskies to the 1991 national championship: Win two of those three, and you’ve won the game. Winning at politics is just as straightforward. The victors in a presidential contest will outperform their rivals in at least two of three categories: the national atmospherics, the state-by-state battle for an Electoral College victory, and the on-the-ground organizing it takes to...

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT RUSH: The long knives are out for Newt. I mean, everybody knows this. Everybody's looking at this. We saw it to one degree or another yesterday, last night in the debate. We've seen it in various publications. Most people, most average citizens -- people who pay attention to politics around election time and shortly after the election to see what's gonna happen. Most people's reaction of Newt Gingrich is not that he had anything to do with Freddie Mac, Fannie Mae. They don't know that. I mean, they're hearing about it now. They don't know what he did.

The December 31 issue of National Review — the last one before the Iowa caucuses — will feature a cover of Newt Gingrich appearing as “Marvin the Martian,” which some of have suggested could be one of the most memorable covers of the bi-weekly magazine. The cover story is the latest in a series of eyebrow-raising moves by the magazine, often considered to be the gold standard for periodicals in conservative politics. On Wednesday afternoon, its editorial page came out vehemently against Gingrich, warning his nomination would place the White House out of reach for the GOP. Mark Steyn, one...

The Securities and Exchange Commission has brought civil fraud charges against six former top executives at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, saying they misled the government and taxpayers about risky subprime mortgages the mortgage giants held during the housing bust. Those charged include the agencies' two former CEOs, Fannie's Daniel Mudd and Freddie's Richard Syron. They are the highest-profile individuals to be charged in connection with the 2008 financial crisis. Mudd, 53, and Syron, 68, led the mortgage giants when the housing bubble burst in late 2006 and 2007. The four other top executives also worked for the companies during...

The foot soldiers of ’94 speak.Newt Gingrich became chairman of the political-action committee GOPAC in 1986, the year that its founder, Gov. Pete du Pont (R., Del.), resigned to seek the party’s presidential nomination. Its mission was to incubate Republicans in local offices and state legislatures so that they could later run for higher office. Determined to win a majority in the House of Representatives, Gingrich accepted the charge with gusto, and du Pont eagerly awaited the results. “[He] was much better and [more] creative with GOPAC than I was,” du Pont recently told William Corkery, a college student who...