NEWT TRANSCRIPT

GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS (ABC NEWS)(Off-camera) How about the broader context? After Columbine, you gave a speech where you blamed 35 - blamed the shootings on 35 years of liberalism.

GRAPHICS: AFTER COLUMBINE

GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS (ABC NEWS)(Voiceover) You said, I want to say to the elite of this country - the elite news media, the liberal academic elite, the liberal political elite, I accuse you in Littleton of being afraid to talk about the mess you have made and being afraid to take responsibility for the things you have done and instead foisting on the rest of us pathetic banalities because you don't have the courage to look at the world you have created.

GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS (ABC NEWS)(Off-camera) Do you stand by that prescription today?

NEWT GINGRICH (FORMER SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE) Yes. I think the fact is, if you look at the amount of violence we have in games that young people play at 7, 8, 10, 12, 15 years of age, if you look at the dehumanization, if you look at the fact that we refuse to say that we are, in fact, endowed by our creator, that our rights come from God, that if you kill somebody you're committing an act of evil.

GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS (ABC NEWS)(Off-camera) But what does that have to do with liberalism?

NEWT GINGRICH (FORMER SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE) Well, who has created a situation I think's essentially zone of not being willing to talk about any of these things. Let me carry another example where I strongly supported Imus being dismissed, but I also think the very thing he was dismissed for, which is the use of language which is stunningly degrading of women - the fact, for example that one of the Halloween costumes this last year was being able to be either a prostitute or a pimp at 10, 11, 12 years of age buying a costume. And we don't have any discussion about what's happened to our culture because while we're restricting political free speech under McCain-Feingold, we say it's impossible to restrict vulgar and vicious and anti-human speech. And I would argue that that's a major component of what's happened to our culture over the last 40 years.

SOURCE:
ABC News Transcript
SHOW: THIS WEEK 10:01 AM EST
April 22, 2007 SundayLENGTH: 2607 wordsHEADLINE: SUNDAY EXCLUSIVE; NEWT GINGRICHANCHORS: GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOSREPORTERS: GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS (WASHINGTON, DC USA)