Newt Skeptical on Aid to Pakistan

Reuters reports:

(Reuters) - Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich on Friday called for more oil drilling in the United States and questioned American aid toPakistan as he took his young campaign to his home state of Georgia.

Gingrich, a former speaker of the House of Representatives during the 1990s, declared himself a candidate in the 2012 presidential election on Wednesday in what many analysts say will be an uphill battle to win the presidency.

In a speech to members of the Georgia Republican Party, Gingrich said the United States needs to reassess the billions of dollars in aid it gives to Pakistan following the killing of Osama bin Laden by U.S. special forces in a daring May 2 raid.

Authorities are now trying to piece together how the al Qaeda leader came to live in the northern Pakistan garrison town of Abbottabad for apparently years before his death.

"When I learned that after paying $20 billion since 9/11, they had been housing him in Pakistan, I kind of forgot what the world 'ally' meant," he said.

"There is a point when you have to say to people around the world, 'How stupid do you think we are?"