Posted on 01/17/2012 2:50:57 PM PST by VinL
At the now-controversial meeting of evangelicals at a Texas ranch, influential evangelical leader James Dobson made a strong pitch for Rick Santorum's wife — and noted that Callista Gingrich was her husband's "mistress for eight years," questioning whether that's what people want in a first lady, three sources told POLITICO.
The moment left several attendees at the confab at the Pressler ranch stunned, according to the sources.
It came on Saturday, before the group of about 150 conservatives voted on a candidate they wanted to back. On the third round of balloting, the vote went to Santorum, but Gingrich backers and other attendees have argued that the voting was done unfairly, and in a way that seemed to benefit the former Pennsylvania senator.
The meeting was initially described as an event to try to unite behind a single candidate to thwart Mitt Romney, but his representatives also ended up speaking there, and despite the third round of balloting — which took place after some Gingrich backers left, thinking the meeting had ended — broad consensus was never reached, according to multiple attendees.
"Dobson first talked about how great Santorum is," recalled one source, who had first-hand knowledge of Dobson's comment. "[He said,] 'I want to tell you that I've gotten to know Karen [Santorum] and she is just lovely. She set aside two professional careers to raise these seven children. She would make a fabulous first lady role model. And Newt Gingrich's wife, she was a mistress for eight years."
Another source confirmed the account, and said Dobson concluded the sentiment about Callista Gingrich with, "Who do you want as your first lady?"
"It was like a chill [set into] the room," said one source. Several people were offended by the comment, said another source, adding that it was noted among some participants that Callista Gingrich had only been married once.
I am so sorry. Didn’t mean to post that directly to you.
I don’t care what Dobson said. I am not voting for any of Gingrich’s ex-wives.
I am voting to get rid of the dipstick in the White House now and replace him with someone with brains enough to maybe save this country.
Gingrich may be the rottenest SOB who ever lived but he is the most qualified for the job, and calling his wife a whore does not change that it only makes Dobson look like an ass.
LOL no prob.
1. This was suppose to be a private meeting where people promised not to leak anything, so I don't think Dobson was trying to hurt Newt. My guess is he wanted people to think about each candidates baggage and how Obama will use that info. Pretending it did not happen isn't realistic. My guess (from the article below) is that the Romney team was ticked and leaked something to hurt Newt. Dr Dobson has warned Christians about the growing Mormon and other cults, push on young people. They hate Dobson.
2. How do we know Policito is telling the truth? Politico is a big McCain fan who also hates Dobson because he would not endorse McCain at the beginning of the primary. He eventually said he would vote for him when Sarah became his VP pick. Note how the Romney team became nasty in the article. I have seen dr Dobson viciously attacked over lies before. Please be sure of what you read knowing how the media manipulates people and stories. Dr Dobson is a Godly man, and a humble one.
The Evangelical Vote
Posted by Erick Erickson (Diary)
Monday, January 16th at 4:46AM EST
“The evangelical movement might have just sown the first seeds of division for 2016 — seeds that, like in 2008 and 2012, prevented evangelicals from getting one of their own the nomination.”
I had the privilege to attend the meeting of evangelicals in Texas this weekend. Due to pressing matters before me Saturday I could not make the Saturday portion, but was there Friday hearing the advocacy for the candidates, the run down, etc. I did not vote.
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As with all meetings of Christian conservatives, we all pledge to have an off the record meeting and a handful of the sinners start leaking like sieves. It is aggravating and typically why I never say a word in these meetings.
Since a few have decided to leak so many details from the meeting as background and anonymous sources, I want to clarify a few things from my perspective and I will do it decidedly on the record.
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The first thing you need to know is that taking shots at Tony Perkins for his statements this weekend is both ignorant and wrong. Tony was selected to speak for the group as a whole and he has done a tremendous job reflecting the views of the consensus whether they are his or not. He didn’t really volunteer as much as he was chosen (I cannot have been the only Presbyterian there) and he has done his job ably.
The second thing you should note is that I personally view the state of the Christian conservative movement poorly. It is such an honor and privilege to be in the same room with James Dobson. Truth be told, I’ve been in the room with him several times and have yet to work up the courage to meet a man who has meant so much to my wife and me. Hopefully I’ll work up the courage one of these days.
But Dobson and the other men and women in the room exemplify my problem with the state of the Christian conservative movement — it is getting really old and I do not yet see authentic, strong voices rising up to succeed these pioneers. I take it as a good sign that these men picked Tony Perkins as their spokesman. In the generation that bridges the gap, Perkins is one of the few honest brokers and genuinely authentic good guys in the evangelical community and conservative movement as a whole.
A great deal of the passionate, younger voices of the Christian conservative movement are focused on Christ and not politics. While that’s a far better position to focus on, I fear the Christian conservative movement is going to be handed down to a few good young men and women surrounded by others with less sincere intentions — people who advocate people and positions in furtherance of things other than Christ’s Kingdom. The up and comers will have to rely on men like Tony Perkins to avoid irrelevance and charlatans both.
The third thing you should know about this weekend is just how well the Gingrich and Santorum camps handled themselves and how poorly the Perry and Romney camps handled themselves. I won’t even get into the advocacy on behalf of Ron Paul, which didn’t go well.
There was a decidedly sympathetic view toward Rick Santorum going into the meeting. He has been one of the leading advocates for socially conservative views. They like him on that. I was, frankly, stunned that even when some of the people chosen to speak objectively about the field pointed out that this will be an election about economics, the crowd really was focused on social concerns.
I won’t go into quotes from the men who advocated for the various candidates. Even on the record here, I want to respect the organizers’ wishes more than others have on background, but both Santorum’s advocate and Gingrich’s advocate (each candidate had someone to speak for them) did those men a great service. The Santorum pitch was largely focused on what he had done for the movement, including for the babies. The Gingrich pitch really reflected what Jonah Golberg wrote recently in his column about Newt. If you think the end of the world is nigh, you want the Churchill, not the technocrat.
Rick Perry had a lot of supporters in the crowd, but too few who thought he could win and many who want him to get out and endorse Gingrich or possibly Santorum before South Carolina votes. His advocate, a friend, was not as well prepared as the others, but many in the crowd did speak up for him.
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The Romney advocacy did more harm than good and I think the biggest story to come out of this event has to be both the hostility between evangelicals and Team Romney and the absolute endorsement for “Not Romney.”
If you are reading this from the media, I think the story you should tell is that Mitt Romney will probably become the nominee of the Republican Party with even less good feelings between evangelicals and him than John McCain had.
The problem for Team Romney is that the distrust of Romney is overwhelmingly about his record and shiftiness, but the Romney campaign fundamentally believes it is about his religion. When Team Romney concluded the pitch (read from an iPad seemingly without a passionate delivery) with an admonishment to not be an anti-Mormon bigot, it was game over. Several of the attendees felt like the Romney campaign was almost implying that they’d win without evangelicals and would expect everyone to line up when it was over even without Romney reaching out.
Note to Team Romney: when you are in a room full of Christian leaders like those who were in that room and who have all long been attacked by the left as bigots, it is unwise — no, it is damn foolish — to accuse them of being anti-Mormon bigots, something too many Romney supporters have descended to as the only possible explanation for daring to not get on board with Romney.
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It’s interesting that the outreach concerns are so universal. Inside the conservative blogosphere, among social conservatives, and among specifically the evangelical community there is a great deal of concern that, unlike John McCain, once the Romney camp has it in the bag they’ll go off to woo independents and leave smoldering or un-repaired bridges back to the base.
As to the vote itself, there was a consensus, but not as strong as the reported vote would have you believe. According to several I talked to who were still there for the vote, it was divided with many thinking Gingrich is the only one who can win and many not sure they want to hitch a wagon to the Gingrich train. On this, there is no difference inside and outside the evangelical community.
What gets me is that given Rick Santorum’s polling in South Carolina, his funding and campaign apparatus, the admonition from one influential person that Santorum doesn’t have the campaign to run for President, etc. separate reports suggest a number of people present decided to vote for Santorum not to beat Romney, but to be Romney’s running mate — something that most likely will not happen.
At this point, a vote for Santorum really does help Mitt Romney, but few are willing to acknowledge that. When given the chance to beat Romney, I was kind of shocked by the people who were already reconciled to his win, though that was not the majority view. Most want to fight till the end, fight to the convention, broker a convention, or do anything else to stop Romney. But by voting for Santorum, the group largely undercut more serious efforts waged by Gingrich to stop Romney and, even more troubling if Romney is the nominee and loses, potentially sets up a claim by Rick Santorum, a man who will have been out of office a decade by then, to be the 2016 front runner.
In a year when we could possibly see Bobby Jindal, John Kasich, Rick Scott, Scott Walker, Marco Rubio, and others, the evangelical movement might have just sown the first seeds of division for 2016 — seeds that, like in 2008 and 2012, prevented evangelicals from getting one of their own the nomination.
That brings up a problem with the evangelical movement within the political sphere — it is often poorly advised on strategy and cuts short term deals that undermine long term goals. But that’s a topic for another day.
Neither of them was married at the time.
If true, it would be a big negative in my view. I've seen only one small story on it so have no idea if it's true or not.
And why exactly is it you've called me "hypocrite"?
Because he was so buff, handsome, seething with passion, enigmatic, charming, masculine, ...and he said his name was Fabio!
Rather, they feel they are upholding God’s standards of good behavior for leaders in the public eye. It is a christian leader’s duty to speak out against immorality
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And you and Mr Dobson know God’s standards???? Especially as they apply to a First Lady? Edify me please— what are the Siena Dreaming moral standards for a First Lady as spoken to you by God???
And what about an absolutely lovely First Lady, Laura Bush. I loved her. BUT, at the national press club dinner, she did tell “barn-yard”, foul, filthy jokes to make her audience laugh. Should Christians have looked for her impeachment? Please tell me.
You then write: “As for your efforts to divert the discussion- what on arth are you talking about?”
What I’m talking about is- this thread is dedicated to discussing the targeted issue of Dobson saying Calista isn’t qualified to be a First Lady. That’s the discusssion. You bring up gay marriage? What are you suggesting- that Calista is not only immoral, but gay?
It’s hard for me to believe that the Ice Queen ever had sex with anyone.
Maybe that’s why Noot chose her.
He wasn't quite. He was having an affair while he was lambasting Clinton. It's one of the reasons the group of Texas evangelical leaders have gotten behind Santorum.
The doctor was married, so Karen Santorum is doing the same thing Calista is alleged to have done, even though nobody has provided any evidence it was true.
Santorum’s judgement should be questioned to have married a person like this, no?
Enough with the hypocrisy.
Total nonsense. Most people are stupid and easily fooled, as they were in 2008. A weak, ineffective GOP message will hand re-election to Obama. And that is what we have so far. You forget what Obama, the media which serves him, and $1 billion can do to shape public opinion this year, especially with blithering idiots like John Boehner in charge in the House.
Not according to the account I read. It said he had already been divorced when they met.
“It’s one of the reasons the group of Texas evangelical leaders have gotten behind Santorum.”
LOL, and now that they know of Karen Santorum being DQ’d for First Lady due to fornicating with an abortion doctor....
Well, now they will rush to change their vote....
H Y P O C R I T E S .........ALL
And you as a christian don't know that immorality is sub-standard in God's view? Really?
what are the Siena Dreaming moral standards for a First Lady
My standards are beside the point. What I have been speaking out about is a Christian leaders perogative to speak out on immorality. I'm for one am glad christian leaders do so and they are not cowed by a politically correct society that says they should shut up.
What are you suggesting- that Calista is not only immoral, but gay?
No, her heterosexuality is quite obvious. Let me spell it out for you...the gay argument is to show the futility of your view. If you think only the completely sinless can cast stones that it follows that no conservative can ever speak out against homosexuality, gay marriage or any negative behaviors. Quite a ridiculous stance to take.
I didn’t know about that. What are the specifics and evidence?
And are you saying that Mitt and Ann Romney are the only squeaky clean couple running for the WH?
I thought Perry and the Mrs. were on the up and up.
Do you have more to go on than one Daily Mail story or are you basing your whole premise just on that?
I wouldn’t know I’m not Catholic, but it is my understanding that they were married in the Catholic Church. I’m sure if that is not true someone will let me know but this is from my memory which is usually pretty good.
Do you have more to go on than one Daily Mail story or are you basing your whole premise just on that?
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