Ed Brayton is a journalist, commentator and speaker. He is the co-founder and president of 
Balko finds this video from Newt Gingrich speaking out in favor of the California referendum to ban gay marriage. He tells people they must support the amendment in order to "defend and protect marriage." Newt Gingrich. The man who has been married three times and cheated, at the very least, his first two wives. The man who invented the "oral sex is not sex" argument (no, it wasn't Clinton, it was Gingrich several years earlier after reports of infidelity first surfaced).
Newt Gingrich. The man who cheated on his first wife, then divorced her while she was in the hospital recovering from uterine cancer surgery -- then refused to pay child support and alimony. A local church actually had to take up a collection to support his wife and children. The man who six months later married his second wife, then cheated on her with a congressional aide -- who he subsequently made his third wife. Newt Gingrich, for crying out loud, is talking about the need to "defend and protect marriage." Newt, if you want to protect marriage, stop getting married. At the very last, stop cheating on every wife you have.
By the way, according to Newt's official website, he and his wife recently narrated a documentary called Rediscovering God in America. Perhaps next year they'll narrate Rediscovering Places to Have a Quickie on Capitol Hill and Not Get Caught So Your Wife Never Finds Out.
Just as bad is the utterly disingenuous argument he makes about "unelected judges." He says it is "judicial tyranny" for "unelected judges" to overturn the "will of the people."
"Think about that. Four appointed lawyers - that's all judges are - overruled more than 4 million California voters."
No kidding. That, of course, is the job of judges. Where was Newt's outrage when the Supreme Court voided the California referendum on medical marijuana, also passed by popular referendum? Where was his outrage when conservatives went to court to demand that those "unelected judges" overrule the will of Oregon voters and overturn their assisted suicide law? As always, this rhetoric is applied only when he doesn't like the outcome.
Politics
Comments
Ed said:
You mean Newt's outrage? :)
Posted by: Braxton Thomason | September 8, 2008 10:12 AM
I blame gay marriage
Posted by: yoshi | September 8, 2008 10:12 AM
It was those damn scandinavians allowing same-sex couples legal rights back in the '80s. Newt's marriages didn't stand a chance.
Posted by: kehrsam | September 8, 2008 10:23 AM
Hooboy. Maybe we do need laws to defend marriage -- from Gingrich and his ilk.
I've never understood how allowing two men or two women to marry threatens any hetero marriage but there are gazillions of things I do not understand.
Posted by: Anne | September 8, 2008 11:03 AM
And this is the man that all those "value voters" out there look to for leadership. What more evidence do we need of the Republican voters' hypocrisy?
Posted by: Julian | September 8, 2008 11:13 AM
Do these people not have handlers? I mean really.
I guess they just bet that the majority of the country either doesn't know about all that, doesn't remember it or more likely, doesn't care.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp, KoT | September 8, 2008 11:41 AM
Of course Newt defends marriage! His motto is "Marriage! So nice I did it thrice!"
Posted by: T. Bruce McNeely | September 8, 2008 12:25 PM
Recent history has shown that they are on the right side of that bet.
Posted by: Shygetz | September 8, 2008 12:38 PM
Those who find this to be hypocritical are correct BUT they aren't thinking like born-agains.
To the bible thumpers sinning is okay as long as you 'repent' (assuming you get caught o/w repenting is unnecessary) and then say a few religious buzzwords to 'prove' your sincerity. In fact the more you sin & repent the better a Chrisitan you are.
It makes no sense to the rest of us but that's because we're rational.
Posted by: Rob Jase | September 8, 2008 1:05 PM
Newt Gingrich. A liar and a cheat. The man has absolutely no integrity.
WHY DOES ANYBODY LISTEN TO HIM?
That irks me.
Posted by: Rod | September 8, 2008 2:49 PM
The most surprising thing about this is that Ed seemed almost taken aback by it. Haven't we firmly established that the "pro-family" bloviators are raging hypocrites by now?
I've never understood how allowing two men or two women to marry threatens any hetero marriage...
That's easy. Gays are "other," "others" threaten the status quo, and loss of status quo means the religious right wouldn't be in charge anymore. As the United States is a Christian nation as per the Founding Fathers, attempts to usurp the religious right constitutes anti-American blasphemy, therefore gays are Satanic foot soldiers out to destroy the fabric of society via divinely sanctioned one-man-one-woman marriage. Quod erat demonstrandum.
Posted by: schism | September 8, 2008 2:57 PM
Is he still around? I though he became politically past tense after he whined about having to use the back door of Air Force One.
Posted by: Ferrous Patella | September 8, 2008 3:03 PM
Rob Jase: "Those who find this to be hypocritical are correct BUT they aren't thinking like born-agains . . . sinning is okay as long as you 'repent'."
This is certainly true. It's the mindset that allows criminals like Chuck Colson to become influential Christian writers.
But there's another major factor: fundiegelicals tolerate a very high degree of cognitive dissonance. How else could they vote for a deserter in preference to a war hero because they thought the deserter would make a better Commander-in-Chief?
You see this all the time with the fundies. The Rethuglicans have spent us into the poorhouse, but they're the party of fiscal responsibility. Tom DeLay is a corrupt bully, but the GOP is the party of "moral values". The list goes on and on.
I've seen this most recently in my own family. We strongly disapprove of out-of-wedlock pregnancies and criticize the parents, yet Sarah Palin somehow gains moral authority for "standing by" her 17-year-old.
Rational people would be driven bonkers by the degree of cognitive dissonance that fundies tolerate without a murmur. Though I suppose we could argue that the fundies ARE stark raving mad . . .
Posted by: Leigh Williams | September 8, 2008 3:31 PM
I've hated this nerfherder ever since he proposed that smuggling an ounce of marijuana into the US should be punishable by the death penalty. He's a pretty muddle-headed guy. It's entirely possible he never thought he was having an affair - he was just so stupid, he forgot he was married.
What kind of name is "Newt", anyway? Surely no one wants to be known as a slimy amphibious creature with toxic skin?
Sorry. I just hate the guy.
Posted by: Al West | September 8, 2008 4:13 PM
It ought not to surprise us when social conservatives overlook, spin, or otherwise minimize the transgressions of their leaders, because they do the same thing every day within their own communities and their own social circles.
Fundigelical legend would have it that liberal policies and liberal ideas are to blame for such social ills as substance abuse, divorce, teenage pregnancy, and crime. What you have to understand it that this is an article of faith, just as much as the virgin birth or the resurrection. It has been falsified left, right, and center - both by national and international statistics and by the state of the communities they see every day. Yet none of this makes a dent because we're talking about an article of faith.
Posted by: DaveL | September 8, 2008 5:16 PM
Remember that his first wife was also his high school geometry teacher.
(cue VanHalen)
I got it bad, got it bad, got it bad . . .
Posted by: Farb | September 8, 2008 7:59 PM
DaveL, right on the money, sir.
Posted by: trog69 | September 8, 2008 10:54 PM
"Maybe we do need laws to defend marriage -- from Gingrich and his ilk."
Wouldn't that be a blast: strengthen the marriage laws, get rid of no-fault divorce, and when someone cheats on their partner, or beats them, or turns out to be an oxycontin drug fiend, the partner get it *all*.
Posted by: Paul Murray | September 8, 2008 11:13 PM
I've always maintained that any constitutional amendment to define marriage as 'between a man and a woman' should, on biblical grounds, also contain the phrase 'and is only dissolved by death'.
Posted by: Daniel Kim | September 9, 2008 8:30 AM
I agree that there seems to be a lot of cognitive dissonance amongst the religious right. That is one of the reasons these people scare me. In fact, there is some cognitive dissonance in the bible: The last shall be first, god's ways look foolish to the world and made the foolish wise. Read that enough times, and you can convince yourself that night is day, black is white and down is up.
Posted by: Blue Nine | September 9, 2008 3:45 PM
Ed said...
You mean, "...Your CURRENT Wife..."
Posted by: Paul Lundgren | September 9, 2008 5:42 PM