WI: Newt Gingrich In 2000

Can Gingrich, who is a more polarizing figure than Bush was in 2000, draw more latent Democratic supporters to come out and vote for Gore rather than sit on their hands in 2000?

Nader certainly would do worse. There was a faction of Democrats who thought Gore and Bush would be basically the same. With Gingrich running, they're less likely to lodge a protest vote.
 
I don't know that he would have done much differently in reaction to 9/11. The real question would be about what came after that, once the initial Afghanistan operation was over with. Would he have followed the neo-con path to Iraq? Or?

I doubt it. He wouldn't have all those Neo-Cons advising him. No Rumsfeld, no Cheney. Most importantly, he didn't have his own mother demanding to know when her son was going to deal with the man who tried to kill Newt's father. That is, no familial vendettas.
 
Gingrich is just too...well....Gingrich. Just the mention of his name draws out some internal uncomfortably in the heart of men (well, moderate and liberal men). He's too polarizing.
Plus, he cheated on his wife with a women in the 90's who he later married. With that, you have hypocrisy (Newt went after Clinton, after all). You also have, independent of that hypocrisy, a smear on moral fiber which won't help with "family values".

So, you have a candidate who makes everybody not a Conservative rather uncomfortable, who has no moral standing as far as politics is concerned, who had gained low approval towards the end, who had spear headed an unpopular bid to remove Clinton, along with some some ethics scandals he garnered along the way, who is going fresh out of all that into a bid for the White House.

Don't forget the time he got behind on his child support.
 
Nader certainly would do worse. There was a faction of Democrats who thought Gore and Bush would be basically the same. With Gingrich running, they're less likely to lodge a protest vote.

If Gingrich was Gore's opponent, which is virtually ASB, then Gore would win in a huge landslide.

Truth be told, I suspect that Nader would do even better than in OTL.

In OTL, many people who would have voted for Nader opted for Gore because the race was so tight. If it was obvious that Al Gore was going to win in a landslide those people would have felt more free to vote their conscience.
 
People have made several excellent points.

Additionally it has to be remembered that following the 1998 mid-terms where the Republicans didn't do so well, Gingrich's name was mud. There was a reason he was forced to resign.

Also, he had no grass-roots support. The only Republicans who liked him were in Washington and a few right-wing intellectuals who liked some of his wonky books.

Even if he had wanted to run for President I doubt his candidacy would ever have been able to get off the ground because he'd have to raise a huge amount of money to do so and his appeal was far, far too limited to do so. Neither the deep pockets Republicans or the grass-roots guys liked him. You can win without one of those groups, but not without either.
 
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