WASHINGTON - Two years before the 2008 presidential election, Newt
Gingrich, the former Republican Speaker of the House of
Representatives, is trying desperately to grab the national spotlight
by declaring he'd be a lot tougher than George W Bush in prosecuting
what he calls "World War III".
In the latest in a series of recent presentations and writings,
Gingrich called this week in a speech at the neo-conservative American
Enterprise Institute (AEI) for, among other things..
- To help "organize every dissident group in Iran" with the goal of
replacing the regime, failing which, "we certainly have to be prepared
to use military force".
- "End" the North Korean regime if it ships nuclear weapons or material
anywhere.
- Insist that Congress immediately pass legislation "that recognizes
that we are entering World War III and serves notice that the US will
use all its resources to defeat our enemies - not accommodate,
understand or negotiate with them, but defeat them".
Gingrich's remarks, which significantly earned a rave review in the
neo-conservative Weekly Standard, came in the context of early
jockeying in the 2008 presidential race, whose leading - albeit
unannounced - candidates besides Gingrich include Arizona Senator John
McCain, former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani, Senate Majority Leader
Bill Frist, Virginia Senator George Allen, and Massachusetts Governor
Mitt Romney....
According to the latest polls, Gingrich, who is widely credited with
masterminding the stunning 1994 Republican landslide that gave the
party control of both houses of Congress for the first time in 40
years, ranks third behind Giuliani and McCain and appears to be making
steady progress among the Republican faithful, who have, according to
pollster Frank Luntz, forgotten the many controversies he generated
during his four-year tenure as Speaker.
After taking responsibility for Republican losses in Congress in 1998,
Gingrich resigned as Speaker, but he has remained politically active as
a senior fellow at the AEI, an advisory board member of the pro-Israel
Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, and a member of Pentagon
chief Donald Rumsfeld's Defense Policy Board (DPB).
In all of these capacities, he, along with fellow DPB members Richard
Perle and James Woolsey, has been an outspoken champion of the hardline
hawks within the Bush administration led by Vice President ***** Cheney
and a constant critic of the State Department, which, from time to
time, he has accused of disloyalty to the Bush agenda.
Indeed, in mid-April 2003, just one week after invading US forces had
consolidated control of Baghdad, he gave a speech in which he charged
that the department was undermining Washington's military victory by
endorsing a high-level dialogue with Syria and the "Quartet's" roadmap
for reviving peace talks between Israelis and Palestinians.
His remarks, which were also delivered at the AEI, were so extreme that
they provoked blunt-speaking deputy secretary of state Richard Armitage
to give USA Today one of the most memorable quotes of the Iraq war:
"It's clear that Mr Gingrich is off his meds and out of therapy." ...
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