Posted on 03/08/2007 10:53:12 PM PST by Luis Gonzalez
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
Ita wasn't about perjury or morality. It was about politics, about weakening your opponent and removing him from power.
...
Heh...
If the Clinton scandals and behavior are going to be an issue in the 08 campaign, perhaps we'd be wise to choose a candidate who doesn't neutralize this.
Someone give that FReeper a cigar!
Well I didn't see the other one and probably wouldn't have found it. Not all of us have time to scan through 300 articles - lol. Good post.
Newt's not dumb by any stretch and getting out front now, before he announces ( if he's going to announce ) is pretty smart.
Let the media have a small run with this and later he can say everyone knows, I admitted it twice now, once in 1998 and now in 2007, twice in a decade publicly, when is enough ..enough?
I forgot to mention -- at it was the key point I intended to make: even though they are mentioning the word "perjury" while they quote Newt, why use an ellipses? What context was not retained? I ask only because it seems to me that much of the meaning was taken away; maybe by including the full text this quote would have more clarity and a sharper barb. Just a hunch.
Hardly news. Everyone knew this was a big part of his resignation.
It was required to pursue the law no matter what his behaviour may have been.
What's disheartening is the palpable hypocrisy of folks who were with the "Character matters" crowd, and now are with the "Go Newt Because You Talk Read Good!" crowd.
I was with the "Character matters" crowd.
Still am. It still does.
The flip makes us look like hypocrites. Worse, it makes us look like Dems.
Because if he emerges as a potential presidental candidate you can rest assured that the Democrats know all the details already and would release them at the appropriate time to do the most damage, unlikely as his presidential candidacy it would be, since Gingrich is damaged goods anyway.
Drives me nuts that reporters "forget" that Clinton was impeached for lying NOT for having an affair.
Yet they seem to gleefully point out that Libby was convicted for lying.
Clinton comitted no crime, but Libby did?
And they can do it with a straight face. Libs are insane!
He was asked by his own caucus to step down for the five seat lost in 98 it had nothing with him cheating on his wife
>>>Dust the dirt off this old story! Wow! Can the MSM be any more obvious???
Is Focus on the Family now part of the MSM? It was an interview with Dobson that brought this story to light, not an inquiry from the MSM.
"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."
So what? Clinton was impeached not because he had an affair but because he committed the crimes of perjury and obstruction of justice from the White House while trying to deny fellow citizen, Paula Jones, a fair trial in federal court.
The most amazing thing about all this is that Newt's a horndog! Cool... where I once faced darkness, I now see a glimmer of light.
Well said. Newt may have some good ideas, but he doesn't have the character to lead the country. He can be secretary of something.
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