Over on the home page, Ed Gillespie, Saul Anuzis, Grover Norquist, and others talk Gingrich. During my reporting, I also spoke with numerous Gingrich confidantes and friends, many who have known the former speaker for decades. Here’s one:
On a personal level, Frank Gregorsky, a longtime Gingrich friend and former congressional aide, says Gingrich has long known that he could build a unique national campaign. American voters, he notes, are not used to a former speaker as a leading presidential candidate. “You would have to go back to the 1880s, with James G. Blaine, to find any kind of similar comparison,” he says.
Yet as much as he wants to see his old ally succeed, Gregorsky acknowledges that Gingrich’s campaign, should it lift off, would face numerous challenges. “Newt’s gift is being able to paint a broad vision of the future that is also historically grounded,” he says. “This can be enthralling. But the dark side of being the visionary and the historian at the same time is that you’re still a person. He may create great excitement about a Republican restoration, but at the end of the day, he is still Newt. I say that with some sadness: Most people that have worked closely for him or with him will tell you that the man is unreliable, changes his mind constantly, and when it comes to projects or legislation, he tends to leave his allies holding dead cats.”
Read the rest here.
UPDATE: Gingrich’s new website is live. He also has a new Twitter account.
UPDATE II: Here’s the video from Atlanta: