Gingrich compares McCain to Abraham Lincoln.

In an interview with GQ magazine yesterday, former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich compared Sen. John McCain’s (R-AZ) effort to rally support around his indefinite commitment to staying in Iraq to “what Lincoln had to do in the Civil War“:

QUESTION: How does your background in history influence your political ideas?

GINGRICH: If you think about the current situation, it helps to remember Harry Truman running in 1948, or even Sarkozy in France. Sarkozy distanced himself from Chirac without being hostile. That’s what McCain has to do with Bush. And what McCain is trying to achieve by explaining the dangers of the world to the public is like what Lincoln had to do in the Civil War.

QUESTION: McCain doesn’t exactly have Lincoln’s rhetorical skills.

GINGRICH: In style he’s closer to Truman, who did not have the rhetorical skills, but had passion.

Gingrich, along with a long list of conservatives, have long sought to cast President Bush as Lincoln-like. Now, with Bush heading out of office, they are trying to do the same with McCain.