Major Garrett: Congresswoman, thank you. Speaker Gingrich, you presided-- as speaker over several foreign aid budgets for the United States. And I remember covering in 1995 the intervention on behalf of the Mexican peso. You have seen, at times, the proper role of the United States through foreign aid and other interventions. I want to know if you agree with-- Governor Perry about starting at zero?
Newt Gingrich: I'm absolute-- I mean, what he said made absolutely perfect sense. Why would you start every year-- and consider the alternative. You're giving some country $7 billion a year. So you start off-- or-- or in the case of Egypt, $3 billion a year. So you start off every year and say, "Here's your $3 billion, now I'll start thinking"? You ought to start off at zero and say, "Explain to me why I should give you a penny."
And let me tell you, the fact that the Pakistanis-- he didn't think about this. The Pakistanis hid Bin Laden for at least six years in a military city within a mile of their national defense university? And then they got mad at the people who turned him over to us? And we think those are the acts of allies? I think that's a pretty good idea to start at zero and sometimes stay there.
Major Garrett: Just a quick follow up, Mr. Speaker. Since you've entered-- since you mentioned Egypt, Mr. Speaker, I just want to know, if you were president, if the aid that we currently provide on an annualized basis to Egypt would be completely rethought and possibly eliminated, if you were president?
Newt Gingrich: It would certain-- it would certainly be completely rethought. And candidly, the degree to which the Arab Spring may become an anti-Christian spring is something which bothers me a great deal. And I would certainly have the State Department intervening on behalf of the (UNINTEL) Christians, who are being persecuted under the new system, having their churches burned, having people killed. And I'd be pretty insistent that we are not gonna be supportive of a regime, which is explicitly hostile to-- to religions other than Islam.
