Gingrich in 2012?

Gingrich in his office, 2001

Although Esquire leans left, one thing I've appreciated over the years is the great job the magazine's writers do in crafting political profiles of key members of the Republican Party. Through deep reporting and bold analysis, I've learned more about John McCain, Mike Huckabee, Rush Limbaugh and Tim Pawlenty -- and what makes them tick -- than from other sources. Now comes another warts-and-all piece from John H. Richardson about Newt Gingrich.

And who better than a chain-smoking ex-wife-- Marianne, spouse No. 2 of Newt's three -- to provide commentary and insight on the naked ambitions, personal foibles and contradictions of her former husband? Make no mistake, though. This isn't a hatchet job. It's a well-rounded piece, featuring revealing scenes where Gingrich meets with supporters as well as the one-on-one interview in the former House Speaker's office on K Street on Washington's Lobbyist Row.

As much as the GOP talks about family values and the sanctity of marriage, I'd forgotten about  Gingrich's story: That he married his high school geometry teacher as a teenager and divorced her while she was recovering from uterine cancer; that he married Marianne, then divorced her in order to marry his present wife, a congressional aide 23 years younger than him.

At 65, he's risen from the depths -- he quit his job as Speaker and resigned from Congress while having an affair with now-Wife No. 3 -- to become the "philosopher king of the conservative movement" and apparent front-runner for the GOP nomination in 2012, based on early polls and the fact he's raised more money this year than Romney, Pawlenty, Palin and Huckabee combined.

"At a moment of doctrinal crisis in the Republican party, Newt Gingrich is the only major figure in his party who is both insurgent and gray eminence," Richardson writes. "That is why twelve years after his career ended — twelve years after any other man in his position would have disappeared from view — he is ascendant."

Two passages in the piece stood out for me:

He's the first person you've ever met who speaks in bullet points. In fact, he sometimes more resembles a collection of studied gestures than a mere mortal, so much so that he gives the impression that everything about him is calculated, including the impression that everything about him is calculated. Which can make him seem like a Big Thinker but also like a complete phony — an unsettling combination.

The failure of the Republican leadership under George W. Bush created an opening for him, he says. Obama's "radicalism" made that opening wider. Now a lot of Republicans are starting to ask, What Would Newt Do?

Or, he puts it another way: "The underlying thematics are beginning to be universalizable in a way that has taken years of work."

Whatever that means...

And then there's this from a fellow Republican:

"I've known Newt now for thirty years almost," says former [Oklahoma] congressman Mickey Edwards . "But I wouldn't be able to describe what his real principles are. I never felt that he had any sort of a real compass about what he believed except for the pursuit of power."

I'm certain that Sarah Palin cannot and will not be nominated in 2012. I haven't a clue who the Republicans might cough up, but after reading this piece on an astonishing political resurrection I won't be surprised if it's Gingrich who takes on Obama two years from now. Read the piece here.

Photograph: Congressional Quarterly/Getty Images