Gingrich: My attackers are 'discordant with the spirit of Christmas'

Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich is putting his critics on the naughty list.

In an interview on Iowa Public Television Thursday, the former House Speaker told Des Moines Register political columnist Kathie Obradovich that former Massachusetts Sen. Mitt Romney and other attackers were "discordant with the spirit of Christmas."

"Are you regretting your commitment to not attack fellow Republicans in kind at this point?" Obradovich asked.

"No, I don't regret it, but there are moments when I chafe under it," the candidate explained. "I can't tell you today, given the millions of dollars being spent on advertising, telephone calls, direct mail -- all of it negative. I don't know at the end of the day that I will be the frontrunner in Iowa."

"I think it's counter-intuitive in the next week -- I mean, we have an ad that will come out in the next week where Callista and I are wishing people a Merry Christmas, and we're talking a in totally positive way. And I just think if these guys keep this kind of negative junk, it is so discordant with the spirit of Christmas."

But holidays haven't always been so sacred for the Georgia Republican.

Gingrich's second wife, Marianne, claimed that "the ex-speaker of the House told her on Mother's Day 1999 that he wanted a divorce, after learning she had a neurological condition that could lead to MS [multiple sclerosis]," according to Akron Beacon Journal's Mickey Porter.

Watch this video from Iowa Public Television, broadcast Dec. 15, 2011.