Gingrich headlines CPAC 2006

Washington, D.C.--Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich headlined a 2006 Conservative Political Action Conference which featured such Republican luminaries as Vice President Dick Cheney, George Will, Senators Bill Frist and George Allen, Ann Coulter, and Judge Charles Pickering, addressing an assembly hall overflowing with attendees from grassroots conservative activists to national media to College Republican delegations representing several states.

The countdown to Gingrich's speech began early in the weekend, with red-clad volunteers from the organization "Winning the Future" handing out stickers and literature declaring that "the future begins in __ hours," counting down each hour until Gingrich's appearance, which started with a bang, as he--unlike every other speaker before him--made his way to the podium to speak not from backstage, but from the rear doors and through the crowd, shaking hands and thanking supporters along the way.

After reaching the podium, Mr. Gingrich acknowledged the crowd and his volunteers, and recognized the College Republicans in attendance, specifically thanking the Georgia College Republicans for their attendance and support. He then folded up his prepared statement, put it in his jacket pocket, and proceeded to give a forty-five minute address from memory, in which he laid out his vision of a new America, and his plan for how to get there.

Gingrich laid out a series of ideas, all centered around redefining government and its role in the daily lives of ordinary Americans. He emphasized the need for the Washington bureacracy to catch up with the speed and efficiency of the private sector in catering to the needs of its constituents, likening the lead-footed, inefficient pace of government to the horse-and-buggy still trying to fit in with the pace of modern life, as evidenced by the failure of government on every level in the Katrina disaster, and the still-ongoing effort to make amends.

Gingrich acknowledged Ronald Reagan's annual attendance at CPAC from conception, saying that Reagan came here "not because America's conservatives needed Ronald Reagan's energy and enthusiasm, but because Reagan needed their energy and enthusiasm." He said that his vision of American conservatism was simple, and similar to Reagan's vision of the Cold War: "we win, they lose."

Though he did not specifically address it in that speech, Mr. Gingrich's address prompted even greater speculation about the possibility of his jumping into the race for President in 2008. His talk about the need to improve government and the way to get there, strikingly reminiscent of the run-up to the Republican House takeover he engineered in 1994, left the door wide open for such a declaration.