Trump, Gingrich could make strong — or combustible — ticket

Whether he is named Trump's running mate or serves otherwise as the Republican presidential candidate's adviser, Gingrich has become an understudy to a because-I-said-so billionaire who is given neither to partnerships nor the intricacies of public policy.

Running mate or not, "Newt Gingrich is going to be involved with our government," Trump said.

[...] not as principal table-kicker of old, who toppled 40 years of Democratic control in the 1994 "Republican revolution" and became House speaker in the tumultuous years of Bill Clinton's presidency.

How would a former history professor, former No. 2 in the presidential line of succession and a man known as "Nuclear Newt" in his 2012 presidential campaign play second banana to Trump?

The answers, according to Gingrich's longtime colleague and friends, lie in the skills and political advice the former Georgia congressman could lend to the billionaire.

The political environment, hostile to government insiders and the American elite, favors both men in that way.

Gingrich's three marriages included public admissions of infidelity, which irks some social conservatives.

[...] that could renew attention on unflattering episodes of Gingrich's Clinton-era history, including a budget standoff that ended in a government shutdown, a near-mutiny by Gingrich's own House allies and an ethics tangle for which Gingrich paid $300,000 toward the cost of the inquiry.