Gingrich digs in his heels in Rosemont, Palatine
With his current delegate count less than a third of GOP presidential front-runner Mitt Romney's, former House speaker Newt Gingrich is hearing a growing number of conservatives suggest he call it quits.
Yet, those calls have been met with nothing but steely resistance by Gingrich, who spoke in Rosemont Wednesday of his campaign as “the kind that can go all the way.”
Just hours after being bested in Tuesday's Alabama and Mississippi primaries, the Georgia Republican was charging hard in the suburbs, kicking off a two-day trip he hopes will motivate voters to choose him over former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum as the most viable conservative alternative to Romney.
He began his visit with a sparsely attended afternoon rally at the Donald E. Stephens Convention Center in Rosemont and closed the day before a crowd of 500 at the Northwest Suburban Republicans' annual Lincoln Day Dinner at the Cotillion in Palatine.
In Rosemont, a crowd of about 100 sat in rows of chairs, cheering and waiving Newt 2012 signs as Gingrich called for “21st Century conservatism” to tackle problems, make advances in science and technology, and work for energy independence.
Attendee Christy Kurzeja, of Barrington, said she doesn't believe Gingrich will win Illinois, but she noted “as long as he's in the race, I'm behind him.”
Kurzeja called Gingrich's 15 percent flat income tax plan, among other ideas, the best of the Republican presidential contenders.
“I've never had a candidate the has represented me before like he has,” she said.
It is Gingrich's ideas that keep him in the race, he said later in the evening at the Lincoln Day Dinner.
In attendance were state party leaders and a majority of suburban members of the Illinois congressional delegation, most of whom have endorsed Romney or stayed silent on their presidential picks.
The annual $100-a-plate event saw a spike in ticket sales shortly after Gingrich's role was announced, Schaumburg Township Republican Committeeman Ryan Higgins said.
Sitting at Gingrich's table were influential Barrington Republican Jack Roeser, 6th Congressional District Gingrich delegate Carol Ann Parisi, House Republican Leader Tom Cross and Illinois campaign Chairman Keith Hanson, of Barrington.
“We've got to go back to the politics of big ideas,” Gingrich said to applause. “We are in the business of changing Washington, not being accepted by it.”
These days, he said, it is almost impossible to have a “serious political conversation” about those ideas.
“The news media can't cover it, and my (competitors) can't comprehend it,” he said.
Gingrich called the country's political system “so profoundly and deliberately stupid,” citing the way the government deals with Medicaid fraud as a “willful avoidance of the modern world” when technology provides a faster way to address abuse.
He is scheduled to appear Thursday at Barrington High School and at Judson University in Elgin, as well as at the Lake in the Hills airport.