Dems have hard road in 2010, Gingrich says

CARY, N.C., Jan. 14 (UPI) -- Democrats in 2010 will have a harder time retaining their hold on U.S. Congress than they did in 1994, when Republicans swept into power, a GOP leader said.

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, quoting a letter from fellow Republican and Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour, said Barbour thought the House "could go Republican this year" and the GOP could pick up several governorships during the midterm elections, The (Raleigh, N.C.) News and Observer reported Thursday.

"It certainly looks like this could be a very, very good year for the American people to send a signal that they don't want higher taxes, more deficits and high spending," Gingrich told reporters before speaking at a dinner of the John Locke Foundation in Cary, N.C.

Gingrich said Barack Obama was, in some ways, "the most ruthlessly effective" president since Lyndon Johnson in the 1960s.

"If you can get $787 billion (the economic stimulus package) out of Congress with nobody having read the bill, that is pretty remarkable," Gingrich said. "He has come closer to passing government-run healthcare than anybody in American history. And he has done so in a pretty relentless way.

But challenges such as high unemployment, energy and terrorism, "are not particularly helpful" to Obama, the former House speaker said.

Looking to the 2012 presidential race, Gingrich said three GOP contenders in the 2008 tilt -- former Govs. Mitt Romney of Massachusetts, Mike Huckabee of Arkansas, and Sarah Palin of Alaska, the party's vice presidential candidate -- were viable candidates in 2012, as are current governors, such as Minnesota's Tim Pawlenty and Indiana's Mitch Daniels.