By Kirsten Powers
Newt Gingrichs self-love is boundless. Unearthing a string of quotes going back to the 1980s, Kirsten Powers looks at the former House speakers long record of self-infatuation.
I told somebody at one point [of my presidential campaign], This is like watching Walton or Kroc develop Walmart and McDonalds. So said Newt Gingrich, whose presidential campaign boasts roughly 40 staff members.
I am going to be the nominee, the modern-day Narcissus declared while gazing at his reflection in the polls.
I am much like [Ronald] Reagan and Margaret Thatcher, the man who was run out of Congress in disgrace and is despised by nearly every conservative who has ever worked with him recently mused to CNN.
I dont want my country to collapse. I dont want my daughter and wife raped and killed, Speaker Gingrich told a stunned Atlanta Journal-Constitution reporter in 1994 in explaining why America, nay, the world, needed him. After all, he told her, People like me are what stand between us and Auschwitz.
Self-aggrandizing distortions of reality have been Gingrichs hallmark for decades. Most recently, he redescribed his sleazy lobbying for conservative bête noire Freddie Mac as the work of a historian. Its not hard to envisage that in the delusional swirl known as Newts thought life this is true. Only in the confines of his gray matter could it make sense that a man who wrote his Ph.D. dissertation on Belgian educational policy in the Congo would be sought out by Freddie Mac for historical advice.
People need to hear what I have to say. Theres no one else who can say what I can say. It doesnt matter what I live, Gingrich explained to Wife No. 2, who was confused that he was dumping her for his mistress the day after giving a speech on family values.
Much More (if your stomach can stand it): Kirsten Powers: Newt Gingrich Is in Love With Himself - The Daily Beast
