Time Names Gingrich Man of the Year : Media: Magazine cites House speaker’s efforts at remaking the federal government and trying to forge a balanced budget.

House Speaker Newt Gingrich, whose energy and political talent have driven Republicans’ efforts to remake the federal government, was named Time’s 1995 Man of the Year.

“Not so long ago, the idea of a balanced budget was a marginal, we’ll-get-to-it-someday priority,” the magazine says in its year-end issue, on newsstands today. “Today, because of Newt Gingrich, the question is not whether a balanced-budget plan will come to pass, but when.”

Yet, little more than a year after he orchestrated the GOP’s first takeover of Congress in 40 years, Gingrich also “has become the greatest liability to the revolution he launched,” the magazine said.

Under an ethics cloud for the dealings of a political action committee he once headed, Gingrich is viewed as too abrasive and uncaring by many Americans, the magazine said.

His approval ratings have sunk steadily over the last few months, and members of his own party often have moaned at his remarks.

In a Time interview, Gingrich said he had failed to adjust quickly to his new role as speaker. “I keep forgetting that all the ground rules have changed,” Gingrich said. “I have consistently, all year, said things that made no sense for the speaker of the House.”

Time’s latest poll, in today’s issue, indicates 72% of Americans believe Gingrich is intelligent and 47% think he has vision for the future.

But 63% say he is too extreme in his views, 56% say they personally don’t like him and an overwhelming 80% say they do not want a “President Gingrich.”