“I think it is a dangerous political exercise... This is not something that Republicans can afford to handle lightly.”

MR. GREGORY:
What about entitlements? The Medicare trust fund, in stories that have come out over the weekend, is now going to be depleted by 2024 , five years earlier than predicted. Do you think that Republicans ought to buck the public opposition and really move forward to completely change Medicare , turn it into a voucher program where you give seniors...

REP. GINGRICH:
Right.

MR. GREGORY:
...some premium support and -- so that they can go out and buy private insurance ?

REP. GINGRICH:
I don't think right-wing social engineering is any more desirable than left- wing social engineering. I don't think imposing radical change from the right or the left is a very good way for a free society to operate. I think we need a national conversation to get to a better Medicare system with more choices for seniors. But there are specific things you can do. At the Center for Health Transformation , which I helped found, we published a book called " Stop Paying the Crooks." We thought that was a clear enough, simple enough idea, even for Washington . We -- between Medicare and Medicaid , we pay between $70 billion and $120 billion a year to crooks. And IBM has agreed to help solve it, American Express has agreed to help solve it, Visa 's agreed to help solve it. You can't get anybody in this town to look at it. That's, that's almost $1 trillion over a decade. So there are things you can do to improve Medicare.

MR. GREGORY:
But not what Paul Ryan is suggesting, which is completely changing Medicare .

REP. GINGRICH:
I, I think that, I think, I think that that is too big a jump. I think what you want to have is a system where people voluntarily migrate to better outcomes, better solutions, better options, not one where you suddenly impose upon the -- I don't want to -- I'm against Obamacare , which is imposing radical change , and I would be against a conservative imposing radical change.

In an interview with us yesterday, Mr. Gingrich conceded that he "probably used too strong language" on TV but that "I have thought about this for a long time and I am very, very worried." He explained that he was trying to articulate "a political strategy for long-term, sustainable change" and that Mr. Ryan ought to have focused on "incentives rather than punishments" and "the right to choose versus being forced to choose." He added that "I think it would be politically catastrophic to pass the bill in its current form" at a moment when conservatives have an opportunity "to break the left for the first time since 1932."

RUSH: Okay, now, I need to ask you because this is something you said on Sunday with Gregory that you didn't believe in "left wing or right-wing social engineering." What is that? Define social engineering for me.

GINGRICH: It's very straightforward. It's when the government comes in and tells you how to live your life and what you're gonna do, whether the values that lead it to do that are left-wing values or the values that lead it to do that are right-wing values. I believe in personal freedom. I believe in your right to lead your life. I believe that we are endowed by the Declaration of Independence, by Our Creator with the right to pursue happiness --and I want a government that is much more humble about its ability to tell you what to do, whether it's people on either side of the ideological spectrum. By the way, it was not a reference to Paul Ryan. There was no reference to Paul Ryan in that answer.

RUSH: Well, then what did you apologize to him about?

GINGRICH: Because it was interpreted in a way which was causing trouble, which he doesn't need or deserve, and was causing the House Republicans trouble. One of my closest friends -- somebody I truly, deeply respect -- e-mailed me and said, "You know, your answer hits every Republican who voted for the budget." Well, my answer wasn't about the budget. I promptly went back and said publicly, and continue to say: "I would have voted for the Ryan budget. I think it's a very important first step in the right direction," and I have consistently said that from the time that Paul first briefed me on it weeks before he introduced it -- and I've been talking with Paul Ryan about budget matters for the last four years.

“This is, at the risk of — as I do on occasion — of getting into trouble with the news media,” Gingrich said, in answering the question, and a few people in the audience chuckled. “…I’m looking seriously at the way the Selective Service Act used to work in the 1940s and World War II where a local Selective Service board who knew the local people made the decisions…because I think we are going to want to find some way to deal with the people who are here to distinguish between those who have no ties to the United States and therefore you can deport them at minimum human cost, and those who, in fact, may have earned the right to become legal, but not citizens.”

“You know, folks often talk about immigration. I always say that to become an American citizen, immigrants ought to have to learn American history. [applause] But maybe we should also have a voting standard that says to vote, as a native born American, you should have to learn American history. [applause] You realize how many of our high school graduates because of the decay of the educational system, couldn’t pass a citizenship test.”

[Immigrants] need to pass a test of American history. And candidly, it wouldn’t be bad to have a test like that for young Americans before they start voting.

You do have a test now for new citizens. I’m just making the point, not that we ought to create a test for young people, but that every young person who graduates from school ought to know American history, and all too often now adays the schools don’t teach you anymore.

VAN SUSTEREN: Which is not insignificant, and I'll get to that in a moment. But first let me ask you about Libya. It's in the news. The president has said that military options with NATO are not off the table. What would you do about Libya?

GINGRICH: Exercise a no-fly zone this evening, communicate to the Libyan military that Qaddafi was gone and that the sooner they switch sides, the more like they were to survive, provided help to the rebels to replace him. I mean, the idea that we're confused about a man who has been an anti-American dictator since 1969 just tells you how inept this administration is. They were very quick to jump on Mubarak, who was their ally for 30 years, and they were confused about getting rid of Qaddafi. This is a moment to get rid of him. Do it. Get it over with.

VAN SUSTEREN: And why do you think -- you say you think it's ineptitude is why the pause or there's different political...

GINGRICH: Look...

VAN SUSTEREN: ... or different diplomacy?

GINGRICH: I think the most generous comment would be ineptitude. It's also an ideological problem. The United States doesn't need anybody's permission. We don't need to have NATO, who frankly, won't bring much to the fight. We don't need to have the United Nations. All we have to say is that we think that slaughtering your own citizens is unacceptable and that we're intervening. And we don't have to send troops. All we have to do is suppress his air force, which we could do in minutes. And then we have to say publicly that he is gone, that the military should switch sides now, and we should help the rebels. And if that means getting them weapons or whatever it means, the fact that there's no more Libyan air power and the fact that the United States has publicly come out for decisively replacing him, I suspect the military will dump him.

All we have to say is that we think that slaughtering your own citizens is unacceptable and that we're intervening. And we don't have to send troops. All we have to do is suppress his air force, which we could do in minutes. And then we have to say publicly that he is gone, that the military should switch sides now, and we should help the rebels. And if that means getting them weapons or whatever it means, the fact that there's no more Libyan air power and the fact that the United States has publicly come out for decisively replacing him, I suspect the military will dump him.

If they’re serious about protecting civilians, you can’t do that from the air. Gadaffi is going to use light infantry, he’s going to use his secret police. He’s going to be in the cities, he’s going to be inside buildings. Your not going to be able to do that with air power. This is a fundamental mistake. And I think is a typical politician’s over-reliance on air power.

And under Mr. Clinton, the IRS has audited a mathematically improbable series of the president's critics. - AC

During the crisis, Gingrich's public image suffered from the perception that the Republicans' hardline budget stance owed partly to a snub by Clinton during the flight to and from Yitzhak Rabin's funeral in Israel.[61] That perception developed after the trip when Gingrich told reporters he was dissatisfied that Clinton had not invited him to discuss the budget during the flight. He complained of being instructed to use the plane's rear exit to deplane, saying the snub was "part of why you ended up with us sending down a tougher continuing resolution".[62]

Gingrich was lampooned for implying that the government shutdown was a result of his personal grievances, including a widely-shared editorial cartoon depicting him as having thrown a temper tantrum.[63] Democratic leaders, including Chuck Schumer, took the opportunity to attack Gingrich's motives for the budget standoff.[64][65] Gingrich later realized his comments were his "single most avoidable mistake" as Speaker.[66]

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Eighty-four ethics charges were filed against Speaker Gingrich during his term (for context, that's 71 more than were filed against Charlie Rangel) including claiming tax-exempt status for a college course run for political purposes.

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On January 21, 1997, the House of Representatives voted to discipline him for ethical wrongdoing. He was accused of using tax-deductible charitable donations to fund a non-charitable college course that he taught, and of giving false information about this to the House Ethics Committee. In a 395-28 vote, the House ordered Gingrich to pay an unprecedented $300,000 penalty as part of a settlement to avoid a full hearing.[5]

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Gingrich acknowledged in January 1997 that "In my name and over my signature, inaccurate, incomplete and unreliable statements were given to the committee". [70] The House Ethics Committee concluded that inaccurate information supplied to investigators represented "intentional or ... reckless" disregard of House rules.[71] Special Counsel James M. Cole concluded that Gingrich violated federal tax law and had lied to the ethics panel in an effort to force the committee to dismiss the complaint against him.

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Republicans lost five seats in the House in the 1998 elections—the worst midterm performance in 64 years for a party that didn't hold the presidency. Polls showed that Gingrich and the Republican Party's attempt to remove President Clinton from office was deeply unpopular among voters.[78] Gingrich suffered much of the blame for the election loss. Facing a rebellion in the Republican caucus, he announced on November 5, 1998 that he would not only stand down as Speaker, but would leave the House as well. Gingrich made this announcement only a day after being elected to an 11th term from his district. Commenting on his departure, Gingrich said, "I'm willing to lead but I'm not willing to preside over people who are cannibals. My only fear would be that if I tried to stay, it would just overshadow whoever my successor is."[79]

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Gingrich has been married three times. In 1962, he married Jackie Battley, his former high school geometry teacher, when he was 19 years old and she was 26.

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In the spring of 1980, Gingrich left Battley after having an affair with Marianne Ginther.

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Six months after the divorce from Battley was final, Gingrich wed Marianne Ginther in 1981.[141][142][143][144] In the mid-1990s, Gingrich began an affair with House of Representatives staffer Callista Bisek, who is 23 years his junior. They continued their affair during the Lewinsky scandal, when Gingrich became a leader of the investigation of President Clinton for perjury and obstruction of justice in connection with his alleged affairs.[145] In 2000, Gingrich married Bisek shortly after his divorce from second wife Ginther. He and Callista currently live in McLean, Virginia.[146] In a 2011 interview with David Brody of the Christian Broadcasting Network Gingrich addressed his past infidelities by saying, "There's no question at times in my life, partially driven by how passionately I felt about this country, that I worked too hard and things happened in my life that were not appropriate."

That wouldn't be dispositive – except for the fact that their only evidence is their word.

But this is how liberals dirty you up when they've got nothing: They launch a series of false accusations, knowing that Americans with busy lives won't follow each story to the end and notice that they were all blind alleys.

The liberal media is an old story, but it's still a big story when it comes to creating the impression of scandal out of thin air.

Most people say, "Where there's smoke, there's fire." I say, "Where there's smoke around a conservative, there are journalists furiously rubbing two sticks together."

Gingrich suggested that Barney Frank and Chris Dodd should be put in jail. “All I’m saying is, everybody in the media who wants to go after the business community ought to start by going after the politicians who were at the heart of the sickness that is weakening this country,” he said.

Gingrich was asked by an audience member to clarify the comments he made last month in which  he called the current child labor laws  ”stupid” and would replace janitors with schoolchildren to work in the community school.

“They have no habit of showing up on Monday and staying all day or the concept of  ’I do this and you give me cash,’ unless it’s illegal,” Gingrich said.

Gingrich said that successful people he knows started work early by doing small jobs like babysitting and shoveling snow.

“You have a very poor neighborhood. You have students that are required to go to school. They have no money, no habit of work,” Gingrich said. “What if you paid them in the afternoon to work in the clerical office or as the assistant librarian? And let me get into the janitor thing. What if they became assistant janitors, and their job was to mop the floor and clean the bathroom?”

“Start with the following two facts: Really poor children in really poor neighborhoods have no habits of working and have nobody around them who works. So they literally have no habit of showing up on Monday. They have no habit of staying all day. They have no habit of ‘I do this and you give me cash’ unless it’s illegal.” (His second “fact” was that every first generational person he knew started work early.)

This statement isn’t only cruel and, broadly speaking, incorrect, it’s mind-numbingly tone-deaf at a time when poverty is rising in this country. He comes across as a callous Dickensian character in his attitude toward America’s most vulnerable — our poor children. This is the kind of statement that shines light on the soul of a man and shows how dark it is.

First, as I’ve pointed out before, three out of four poor working-aged adults — ages 18 to 64 — work. Half of them have full-time jobs and a quarter work part time.

Furthermore, according to an analysis of census data by Andrew A. Beveridge, a sociologist at Queens College, most poor children live in a household where at least one parent is employed. And even among children who live in extreme poverty — defined here as a household with income less than 50 percent of the poverty level — a third have at least one working parent. And even among extremely poor children who live in extremely poor areas — those in which 30 percent or more of the population is poor — nearly a third live with at least one working parent.

Throughout the world, in the name of progress, men who call themselves communists, socialists, fascists, nationalists, progressives and even liberals, are unanimous in holding that government with its instruments of coercion, must by commanding the people how they shall live, direct the course of civilization and fix the shape of things to come.... [T]he premises of authoritarian collectivism have become the working beliefs, the self-evident assumptions, the unquestioned axioms, not only of all the revolutionary regimes, but of nearly every effort which lays claim to being enlightened, humane, and progressive.

So universal is the dominion of this dogma over the minds of contemporary men that no one is taken seriously as a statesman or a theorist who does not come forward with proposals to magnify the power of public officials and to extend and multiply their intervention in human affairs. Unless he is authoritarian and collectivist, he is a mossback, a reactionary, at best an amiable eccentric swimming hopelessly against the tide. It is a strong tide. Though despotism is no novelty in human affairs, it is probably true that at no time in twenty-five hundred years has any western government claimed for itself a jurisdiction over men's lives comparable with that which is officially attempted in totalitarian states....

But it is even more significant that in other lands where men shrink from the ruthless policy of these regimes, it is commonly assumed that the movement of events must be in the same direction. Nearly everywhere, the mark of a progressive is that he relies at last upon an increased power of officials to improve the condition of men.

Recall that, just like President Obama, President Reagan inherited a terrible economy when he took office. But Reagan enacted historic income tax rate cuts, regulatory reforms and spending controls. The recession officially ended in November 1982, and in the following two and a half years the unemployment rate dropped 3.6 percentage points, more than eight million Americans went to work at new jobs, and the longest period of economic growth in American history commenced.

Mr. Obama's policies have been just the opposite...

The president barnstorms the country advocating tax increases for investors, entrepreneurs and small businesses, teeing up the country for another crash in 2013 when the Bush-era income tax rates expire. Meanwhile, America's businesses continue to suffer from the highest business tax rate in the industrialized world, with no relief in sight.

This nightmare will not end until Reagan-era economic policies are restored: tax reform, a sound dollar and smarter regulations. If they are, within a year the American economy will take off on another historic boom.

First, we must reduce the federal business tax rate to 12.5%, eliminate the capital gains tax as a double tax on capital income, and eliminate the estate tax. We must allow immediate expensing (writing off the costs in one year) for investment in capital equipment so American workers can continue to be the most productive in the world, using the latest and most advanced technology.

in a new ad, with a voice-over that says at one point, “just like John Kerry, he speaks French, too.”