GINGRICH GAINING THE UPPER HAND.

Prospective South Carolina Republican voters in Saturday's primary, saw fire coming out of the belly of Gingrich, who now seemed to be the front runner in the Republican Party nomination race to find a fitting candidate to square off with President Barack Obama in the forthcoming 2012 presidential election.

The year's November month is still far out in the future, but Gingrich has found a way to start it well with his political campaign, and people are speculating that if he continues in that mode, he will inevitably be the person for his party's choice.

Thursday's CNN debate with Romney, Santorum and Paul, all formidable rivals in the race, proved Gingrich beyond all reasonable doubt to be ready for any eventuality in the fight for the White House.

The Democratic Party and Obama are poised to retain it (White House), and will probably reclaim the United States House of Representative while at it, but the forcefulness of Gingrich, which has become an unexpected factor on the campaign trail, must be seriously looked at and be paid attention to before it goes any father.

He is using all his arsenal, political experience, intellectual, coupled with academia savvy and pure human metabolism to keep up and out maneuver his challengers on the platform in every single debate.

His style somehow has been unmatched by Romney or Santorum or Paul, from the way he faces his questions head on and gives forthright responses to them; and that has made him the darling of the live audiences at the debates and those watching him on television.

Throughout the debates, whether the question is about his connection with the giant housing Freddie Mac, through to the one about his ex-wife, designed to take his attention off his routine, he is always being candid and will not mince his words in his answers.

His opponent, Romney, would like to dodge questions about his tax returns and dilly dally around the health care law he has passed, while he was governor of Massachusetts, Gingrich would not do such a thing. He would come out and make his presence felt.

Why? Because he wants to prove that he has nothing to hide, and that his life is an open book for the media and anyone else; though he may have some parts of it (life) that are unsavoury, he will be willing to discuss them without reservation.

That is what people are looking for, to be candid and straight forward, when one is confronted with even nasty questions and the way one reacts to them.

Gingrich has done it all to almost perfection, but should he were to win his party's nomination, would he be able to continue in the way he was going?

Obama, as sitting president, would have all the facts at his finger tips; whether it was foreign policy, the economy or immigration, he would have the correct responses waiting to counteract any criticisms of whoever his challenger would be.

His party was also doing its part to get rid of the "tea party" element in the House of Representatives that presented gridlocks and road blocks to the party's policies that could not materialize in the last session of the U.S. Congress.

Democrats did not want the repeat of what Congress became like; dysfunctional and uncompromising attitudes that pervaded the lawmaking body and divided opinions that almost brought the country to a standstill.

The debt ceiling and deficit reduction talks failed, leading to the failure of the "Super Committee", which became a waste of time; and the latest one being the payroll tax cut extension, forcing it to have a two months duration instead of twelve.

The only thing that would be good for the country would be for lawmakers to realize that there were issues to be resolved, and if they were not taken care of, matters would become worse.

Bi-partisan solutions would be hard to come by; but compromises must be reached somehow, for the country to unite rather than being polarized.

It was the hope that, either under Obama or Gingrich or Romney or Santorum or Paul, that goal could be achieved in the coming year.

As far as yesterday's debate (CNN, 01/19/12) is concerned, Gingrich has managed to gain the upper hand among his peers.