Newt Gingrich admits he was having an affair while leading the impeachment effort against President Bill Clinton for lying about his affair with Monica Lewinsky. Now that Newt has been forgiven (while Rudy G the crossdresser has not), what's the over/under on how long before he declares he's running for President and the entire Religious Right falls in lockstep with him? http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1597666,00.html?cnn=yes Gingrich's Affair During Clinton Probe Thursday, Mar. 08, 2007 By AP/BEN EVANS WASHINGTON—Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich acknowledged he was having an extramarital affair even as he led the charge against President Clinton over the Monica Lewinsky affair, he acknowledged in an interview with a conservative Christian group. "The honest answer is yes," Gingrich, a potential 2008 Republican presidential candidate, said in an interview with Focus on the Family founder James Dobson to be aired Friday, according to a transcript provided to The Associated Press. "There are times that I have fallen short of my own standards. There's certainly times when I've fallen short of God's standards." Gingrich argued in the interview, however, that he should not be viewed as a hypocrite for pursuing Clinton's infidelity. "The president of the United States got in trouble for committing a felony in front of a sitting federal judge," the former Georgia congressman said of Clinton's 1998 House impeachment on perjury and obstruction of justice charges. "I drew a line in my mind that said, 'Even though I run the risk of being deeply embarrassed, and even though at a purely personal level I am not rendering judgment on another human being, as a leader of the government trying to uphold the rule of law, I have no choice except to move forward and say that you cannot accept ... perjury in your highest officials." Widely considered a mastermind of the Republican revolution that swept Congress in the 1994 elections, Gingrich remains wildly popular among many conservatives. He has repeatedly placed near the top of Republican presidential polls recently, even though he has not formed a campaign. Gingrich has said he is waiting to see how the Republican field shapes up before deciding in the fall whether to run. Reports of extramarital affairs have dogged him for years as a result of two messy divorces, but he has refused to discuss them publicly. Gingrich, who frequently campaigned on family values issues, divorced his second wife, Marianne, in 2000 after his attorneys acknowledged Gingrich's relationship with his current wife, Callista Bisek, a former congressional aide more than 20 years younger than he is. His first marriage, to his former high school geometry teacher, Jackie Battley, ended in divorce in 1981. Although Gingrich has said he doesn't remember it, Battley has said Gingrich discussed divorce terms with her while she was recuperating in the hospital from cancer surgery. Gingrich married Marianne months after the divorce. "There were times when I was praying and when I felt I was doing things that were wrong. But I was still doing them," he said in the interview. "I look back on those as periods of weakness and periods that I'm ... not proud of." Gingrich's congressional career ended in 1998 when he abruptly resigned from Congress after poor showings from Republicans in elections and after being reprimanded by the House ethics panel over charges that he used tax-exempt funding to advance his political goals.
Hypocritical douche bag. How can you even say this kind of thing with a straight face? I can understand the "perjury" argument - but the high-falutin' conservative viewpoint/talking-heads has always held "morality" way above any such judicial claims. That's why you still see jokes from Coulter and the the other right-wing idiots about "slick willy" and his adulterous lifestyle. Hypocrites.
so morally, perjury is worse than adultery? I'm pretty sure if newt was at the stands at the time he'll lie about it as well just like what rhad said, he's still a big hypocrite
we don't have laws against adultery. we do have laws against perjury. i think cheating on your wife is wrong. i'm old fashioned that way. but, that's not the issue here. all of us make stupid mistakes. i'm not about to judge bill clinton's heart. but we do judge lying under oath all the time.
This is very old news but I guess he wants public discussion on it now instead of later. Throwing his garbage out on the street early is proof he is serious about running.
who is talking about morals? certainly not me. though, i do think it's morally wrong to cover your ass by lying under oath. whether you have an R or D by your name.
And the point about the emphasis on said adultrey? I mean, I'm not arguing the perjury claim at all. Well, I would argue that perjury about sex seems much less impeachable to me than lying to the whole country about motives for war, strangling multiple amendments, and tacitly supporting torture. So I have two forms of hypocrisy to beef with: 1) The moral "outrage" that prompted this perjury investigation. 2) Newt's silence on our current president's inability to uphold the constitution.
Exactly- Politicians are people who like clergy should be held to a higher standard of public trust- perjury is a very serious offense since lying under oath undermines the entire judicial process- it is usually a felony crime hypocrisy, while not a felony crime, still violates the public trust because citizens should not be expected to trust government leaders that hide the truth about themselves. Clinton and Gingrich are examples of leaders with very poor character and moral sincerity. Politics is more and more a business of lying, cover-up and compromise.
i don't remember how Newt handled all that, honestly. but in truth, they're all hypocrites..as are we, usually. it's a lot easier to see the faults in others than the faults in ourselves. particularly in the "team sport" environment of politics in America. when you're already villifying someone because they are of a certain political party, it's easier to cast all kinds of crap on them. or judge them more harshly. you don't have to work very hard to get there. i wouldn't disagree with your second point. i'd impeach for both. and i'm not exactly a rambo-style hard ass!
Really? You would have impeached Clinton for lying about something he should never been asked about at all? I very rarely side with someone who brakes the law, but I'd like to think I could make exceptions for private issues with no reasonable bearing on performance or criminal dealings - regardless of any political, social, or business affiliation. My humble opinion of course.
it was in the context of a sexual harassment suit. he impeded that case by failing to disclose information about his relationships with OTHER underlings. in the context of a sexual harassment suit, that stuff is extremely relevant. it's not ok to do that. i don't think it's ok to send the message that if you're the commander in chief you can lie under oath. i don't think the standard for them should be lower...but rather, higher...than for the rest of us. i don't want a king.
Clinton and Bush both are miserable leaders... the fact that 50% think otherwise on both sides just proves that we as a people should look in the mirror and point a finger at the root problem. I have been dumbed down and mass manipulated by media, politicians and amusements. I am trying to recover. We are fighting a war Hanging in the mall Give me a Starbucks I'll play the Stocks Or try my Lotto While the role models Check into detox The libs and the conservs Are right and left Without a protection From bad goverment Just keep the credit Keep the faith Keep the Nation Divided by race Just fill my perscription Just give me a beer American Idol And Leno or Dave What's wrong nothing The weekend is here p*rn on the net Girls with that tat Leave it to Beaver-hah America's fat Viagra and Cholesterol Terror and Torture Legal Immigration Legalize drugs Legalize everything America can't fail We vote half and half Every four years We the people All we like sheep Internet ipod And blackberry tones Mom is at work Dad left home America's strong The TV's still on.
Noted and acknowledged, but still somewhat tangential to the original motive. Good point though. That was not even remotely my point, or my objective. I would like to think that when one is unfairly questioned about private matters, some degree of discomfort and/or reluctance is understandable. Was he correct to perjure himself? No. Was this offense impeachable, given the circumstances? No.
i can certainly understand why you'd feel that way. maybe it digs at me more because i'm an attorney and have to deal with people lying under oath to my questions too often. i certainly understand why you'd say what bush has done is far worse by degrees.
You know Max, you bring this up a lot. Somehow I never hear you condemn Starr's team for leaking Grand Jury information. I never hear you condemn Starr for using a law partner as an intermediary (A violation of the Independent Counsel statute) to supply info to the Jones team so they could ask specific questions of Clinton that only Starr knew so that Starr could then come back and charge "perjury." I never hear you condemn Starr for threatening Lewinsky in an attempt to get her to say Jordan and Clinton promised her a quid pro quo. I never hear you condemn Starr for not telling Reno he was in contact with and even contributing to the Jones case before his appointment. I don't see you questioning the fact that Jesse Helms met with the Judges who would then appoint Starr soon after. And there's a lot more... I haven't even mentioned Tripp's relations with the Jones team, Coulter's claim to have heard the tapes before they were publically acknowledged, Goldberg's role, etc. This was not a simple case and it only seems that way if you buy the rhetoric of the right during the time. The case was never about perjury and everyone, including you, know it. Perjury is what Starr and the Republicans hung their hopes on. No doubt Clinton lied, and did it with gusto, particularly with the televised finger wag, but he was also unethically set up by Starr and the Jones team and even then the perjury charges were not strong and the Senate voted against impeachment. This was a classic definition of a perjury trap... Starr fed the Jones Attorneys with info to ask Clinton and then called Clinton before a Grand Jury in the hopes that he would lie about the Jones answers. (Keep in mind the Jones Judge dismissed the Lewinsky stuff in the Jones case as immaterial to the claims.) There was literally nothing else they could get Clinton on... no Whitewater, no Travelgate, no murder of Vince Foster, etc. The fact that he outsmarted them from a position of incredible weakness just shows you what bumbling hacks these guys really were. Now, it may be too late, but I really don't want to rehash this whole era... but when you throw stuff like this out with no historical context, it drives me nuts and I feel compelled to respond.
Now to the topic at hand... "There are times that I have fallen short of my own standards. There's certainly times when I've fallen short of God's standards." Yes, like most of your life. When I worked on the Hill, I went out with a gal from Newt's office for a few weeks. There was persistent rumor that several women were servicing him. (Note: I never actually saw Newt receiving fellatio... thank goodness... so this all hearsay.) I guess given what's come out recently, the good thing you can say is that he's not in the closet or making moves on kids, though some of those who were included in the rumors were quite young... college or just out of.
I find it interesting about american Politics we allow . . uhm . . deceptiveness and technicalities to rule our country to me Deceptiveness is as bad or worse than a lie I also don't like 'plausible deniability' or 'willful blindness' these little games we play to escape blame for things is ridiculous and why our politics suck Bush can claim Plausible deniability for the WMD reports going to Iraq etc but at the end of the day . .to me. .the Admin was deceptive and that is not cute to me I hate the semantics and word plays etc Rocket River
