I do not intend to waste any time commenting on the dog-and-pony show that has already begun among Republicans to win the nomination for president of the United States in 2012. But I could not resist commenting on how former Speaker Newt Gingrich is attempting to neutralize the criticisms about his notorious moral turpitude that other Republican contenders are bound to hurl at him.
In a nutshell, Newt is the self-righteous SOB who led the impeachment of Bill Clinton for lying about his affair with White House intern Monica Lewinsky. Yet it was later revealed that – at the very time he was leading this crusade – he himself was having an affair with a 23-year-old Congressional aide.
But nothing betrays the moral vacuity of this man quite like the way he visited his first wife in hospital – where she was recovering from cancer-related surgery – only to tell her that he was divorcing her.
Therefore, it should come as no surprise that this dead-beat dad, draft dodger, check kiter, book-sale scammer, embezzler, thrice-married serial adulterer had the unmitigated gall to go on the Christian Broadcasting Network yesterday and give the following testimony:
There’s no question at times of my life, partially driven by how passionately I felt about this country, that I worked far too hard and things happened in my life that were not appropriate… I was doing things that were wrong, and yet, I was doing them… I found that I felt compelled to seek God’s forgiveness.
(Associated Press, March9, 2011)
Did you get that?! In the heat of his passion for this country he mistakenly had a passionate affair with a staffer young enough to be his daughter.
In any case, this was clearly a craven bid to curry favor with the Evangelical Christians whose votes he will need to win the nomination. I am reminded of what British moralist and man of letters Samuel Johnson said about patriotism being the last refuge of a scoundrel. But Newt is one scoundrel who evidently hopes to find refuge in both patriotism and religion.
More to the point, his delusions of grandeur are such that he really thinks – even after his litany of scandals forced him to resign as Speaker and leave Washington in disgrace in 1999 – that he can now wrap himself in the flag, claim religious conversion, and return as president of the United States.
Now that’s chutzpa! No doubt he thinks Evangelical Christians are so stupid that they will buy into his the-country-made-me-“do-it” confession. But I doubt even the wackos in the Tea Party are stupid enough to do so.