Newt to be at Jim DeMint's Presidential Forum

Newt's campaign confirmed he would take part in the Palmetto Freedom Forum, which is occuring in South Carolina over Labor Day Weekend and of which South Carolina Senator Jim DeMint is a co-sponsor.

"Candidates will take turns fielding questions from the trio of panelists for roughly 20 minutes at a time," writes Peter Hamby of CNN. An actual conversation when determining who should be the next President -- what a concept!

In other news, Newt will be at the Georgia GOP Fish Fry this Saturday. It will be Noon to 2 PM.

Here is the Facebook event page.

Also, Newt will be on Sean Hannity's TV show Wednesday night.

Yesterday Marked Fifteen Years since Welfare Reform

Yesterday, Newt sent out two tweets from his personal account:

Link.

Today is 15th anniversary of welfare reform. The shift to state control and personal responsibility dramatically improved people's lives.

and

Link.

We should build on success of welfare reform by applying block-granting Medicaid and other means tested federal programs.

For a public policy course, I wrote this paper on welfare reform last year.

Newt to tour New Hampshire facility that uses Lean Six Sigma

On Thursday, Aug. 25, Newt Gingrich will visit the Manchester, New Hampshire production facility of Freudenberg-NOK Sealing Technologies to observe how the company uses Lean/ Six Sigma processes in its manufacturing and business processes to improve quality, reduce waste and gain operational efficiencies. Gingrich is advocating Lean/ Six Sigma be applied to the federal bureaucracy to save taxpayers money and eliminate unnecessary waste and abuse.

...

Freudenberg-NOK is a leading producer of advanced sealing and elastomeric technologies for a variety of industries including automotive, aerospace, appliance, diesel engine, agriculture, construction, heavy industry, and alternate energy.

Newt's interview with Craig Ferguson from September 2009

Link to Part 1.



Link to Part 2.



It's quite funny.

"Why Newt Gingrich Should be The Republican Nominee for President "

Newt's campaign Twitter account (Newt2012HQ) today tweeted out the great blog post from Justin Gray "Why Newt Gingrich Should be The Republican Nominee for President. If you haven't already, please read it here.

Justin, again, can be followed on Twitter by following this link. Follow Newt2012HQ as well please. Re-tweet Justin's post, and if you are on Facebook, share it with friends.

(Video) Newt at Des Moines-Register Soapbox

Link to video.

"Gingrich Enlists Six Sigma Army."

(This is another story that has been pushed back. It was written the day after Newt's conference call on Lean Six Sigma, which I recapped here.)

From Lori Piotrowski:

On a teleconference call to hundreds of devoted practitioners of LSS, Gingrich sounded the clarion call.

He was hoping to galvanize Six Sigma users to help him educate the public.

“This hasn’t been presented to the American public,” and until they recognize what Six Sigma policies can do, they won’t ask for it.

"Give a speech to your Rotary Club, write a letter to the editor, give a tour of a Six Sigma facility to elected officials," he suggested.

Gingrich has been a follower of the Six Sigma management system for many years

....

Gingrich singled out the civil service and regulatory system as two examples of government waste. The civil service has a history of 130 years, and it is entrenched in the government, he added. "This is a fundamental change, and it won't be easy to do."

As Gingrich took calls from listeners, a general contractor from South Carolina talked about the amount of waste she sees in the multiple layers of management and asked what she could do to help.

Gingrich suggested that she write down the issues that she sees and send them to him. He is forming a committee to start looking at issues and begin to formulate a response.

"You don’t need to provide the answer to the problem. We start by looking at systems that will work rather than focusing on what is not," he emphasized.

"What was expected to be a small gathering turned out to be a packed house."

From a Maui TV station:

On Saturday night Gingrich met with Maui residents at the Door of Faith church in Wailuku.

What was expected to be a small gathering turned out to be a packed house

"We're clearly talking to 'Candidate Gingrich' now and I love being here, but we're also campaigning all through Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina. We're on the way, we'll be in New Hampshire again this week and we'll be campaigning very intensely from now till Christmas," Gingrich says.

Gingrich will hold another public event at Seabury Hall in Makawao on Monday morning.

"Hundreds" attended the townhall.

Here is video from the event:

Newt 2012 has seen "an uptick" in donations since Ames Debate

Rebutting those who say Newt is not serious about raising money, Politico did a story in the middle of last week in which they quote Newt's spokesman R.C. Hammond: "[Newt] spends a lot of his days -- six or seven hours -- on the phone, goes to dinner, then goes into an evening session."

"Gingrich's campaign says he’s been on a circuit of unpublicized, intimate house parties," writes Kendra Marr.

"Small gatherings in people’s homes is low overhead on our end. Hearing Newt talk, explaining what he’ll do for the country -- it’s much more effective," Hammond said.

Marr: "His campaign says he recently saw an uptick in online contributions after the Republican primary debate in Iowa, where his criticisms of the supercommittee and the media drew the biggest applause of the night."

I don't ask for contributions to Newt's campaign often, but please go to Newt.org and give what you can.

Newt's newsletter on energy exploration

(So I have been late in getting this up, but there have have been a lot of things going on and I try not to go over five posts a day.)

But here it is. And as always to sign up for Newt's newsletter, follow this link.

Newt asked House Republicans to follow the lead of both Virginia Democrat Senators who have authored a bill that would open up offshore drilling. Which would, writes Newt, "create jobs, grow federal, state, and local revenues with no tax increase, and speed the production of American energy.

Since the vast majority of Americans favor an American energy policy for economic and national security reasons, this bill should be very popular with Democrats, Republicans, and Independents."

Further:

Offshore oil development could add more than 15,000 jobs in Virginia and add $3.2 billion to the Commonwealth’s economy, according to a 2009 report published by the American Energy Alliance.

Governor Bob McDonnell supports the bill. Both candidates for U.S. Senate from Virginia in 2012 (Democrat Tim Kaine and Republican George Allen) also support it. Since Kaine was previously Chairman of the Democratic National Committee, his support may make it easier for some Democrats to vote in favor.

McDonnell is a conservative Republican, as in Allen. So while some short-sighted conservatives balk at any idea of "bipartisanship," this bill is basically everything conservatives want in the area of offshore drilling.

Newt writes:

Senator Webb's statement described that the bill would direct the Department of Interior to include Lease Sale 220 in the nation’s 2012-2017 five-year oil and gas lease plan.

The area could have a resource potential of as much as 750 million barrels of oil, but again, that number is based upon seismic research done more than 30 years ago with technology that is out of date today. Given new exploration capabilities and new drilling technologies, the real number could be billions of barrels.

Such outdated estimates have often dramatically underestimated the potential of American energy. The estimate of the Bakken formation in North Dakota has jumped 25 fold (2500%) since 1995 due to new technology.

The amount of natural gas in shale has increased our estimated supply of natural gas by more than 15 fold (1500%) in the last decade.

A modest 4 fold increase in the oil estimated off the coast of Virginia would yield reserves of three billion barrels of oil—a supply worth hundreds of billions of dollars.

New oilfield innovation has turned around a 25 year decline in American oil production, and domestic supplies are growing once again.

American oil production could grow even faster if President Obama’s unnecessary regulatory barriers were removed. Drilling off the Virginia coast is an excellent place to start.

On the strategic value of passing bill that is great policy but also has significant Democrat support, Newt writes:

House Republicans should seize the opportunity.

They should pass the House bill exactly as it is and challenge the Senate to act on this bipartisan proposal.

There are a significant number of Democratic Senators who have said they favor energy development. This would be a chance for them to be bipartisan and solution-oriented.

With the support of some Democrats, President Obama would have to decide if he would veto a bipartisan bill that would creates jobs, energy, and federal revenues.

Offshore drilling has enormous potential to be a first step toward breaking gridlock in Washington and toward a real plan to American Energy for Prosperity. Washington should act soon on this truly bipartisan plan.

If the bill came up for a vote in the House, it would almost assuredly get some Democrats to vote for it. So would Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid really table a proposal that has bipartisan support in both chambers? And if he does, it's a great issue to take to the American people in just over 14 months.