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Gold9472
03-09-2007, 12:12 PM
Gingrich Had Affair During Clinton Probe
Former House Speaker Admits He Was Cheating, Says Clinton's Lie Was At Issue

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/03/09/politics/main2551861.shtml?source=mostpop_story

WASHINGTON, March 9, 2007

(AP) Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich 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.

PhilosophyGenius
03-09-2007, 06:33 PM
That's some serious self-pwnage.

Good Doctor HST
03-09-2007, 11:09 PM
So what you're telling me is a staunch republican preaches the moral way, then turns around and acts in the opposite manner when it hits close to home? Kind of like John Ashcroft taking care of his nephew's drug transgressions? or Mr. Limbaugh's self-medication? or Bill Bennett's slot-machine-infatuation while writing "The Book of Virtues"?

beltman713
03-10-2007, 10:28 AM
So what you're telling me is a staunch republican preaches the moral way, then turns around and acts in the opposite manner when it hits close to home? Kind of like John Ashcroft taking care of his nephew's drug transgressions? or Mr. Limbaugh's self-medication? or Bill Bennett's slot-machine-infatuation while writing "The Book of Virtues"?
Sounds just about right.

PhilosophyGenius
03-10-2007, 06:29 PM
I wonder how this was discovered?

Anyways, Gingrich is a piece of shit. He's an idiot. He's always making outragous statements and acting as they're facts. And there's always a thin line with what he says; meaning he always knows the correct way to say something, but if someone (in the other party) says something just slightly different, then they hate America.

beltman713
03-10-2007, 06:42 PM
I read some commentary somewhere on Gingrich and they said something to the effect of "Although Gingrich has some good ideas, his hypocrisy would prevent him from becoming president."

I was like, what fucking "Good" ideas are they talking about?

PhilosophyGenius
03-10-2007, 07:51 PM
Another thing about Gingrich, at one point he suggested the war was going well and that critisizing it will embolded out enemies. Now he's jumped on the bandwagon saying the war isn't going well, wasn't handled well, but if you try to change course it's emboldening our enemies. He does a bunch of stupid shit like that, where he always talks as if he's the all knowing one and he's talking down to everyone, meanwhile he's always contradicting himself and changing the standards for what's right and what's wrong.